E 



.yfefe 



^ i I HIS? 






c«rsr 






^ 



ijcs;^ 


^jgP 


<*^i, 




fe^SS? 


- vifi^j 


«vj**3v. 


J&tSjj 


C_-' *^-- 


* ^jjr|5 


|*3 ^ 


**£2§ 


r.<^ ^^Sm 


«■•■:. "«S 






c Hi 















35 ^ 






c c «: 



t LIBRARY OF CONGRESS.' 

* 

I J UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, J 









^ itfJCS 












^■«g. 






#? C 



Wf 









(C« 






■ c^^^c 3SC 









*d 



Jihiriii nr flitnrrtj ; iljt <0rrnt I f ntinnnl testa. 



THREE PRIZE ESSAYS 



ON 



AMERICAN SLAVERY. 



THE TRUTH IN LOVE 




BOSTON: 

CONGREGATIONAL BOARD OF PUBLICATION. 
185 7. 






Ll 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1857, by 

SEWALL HARDING, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 



CAMBRIDGE : 

ALLEN AND FARNHAM, STEREOTYPERS AND PRINTERS. 
\ 



PREMIUM OFFEEED. 

A benevolent individual, who has numerous friends 
and acquaintances both North and South, and who has had 
peculiar opportunities for learning the state and condition of 
all sections of the nation, perceiving the danger of our 
national Institution^jmd deeply impressed with a sense of 
the importance, in this time of peril, of harmonizing Chris- 
tian men through the country, by kind yet faithful exhibi- 
tions of truth on the subject now agitating the whole com- 
munity, offered a premium of Si 00 for the best Essay on the 
subject of Slavery, fitted to influence the great body of 
Christians through the land. 

The call was soon responded to by nearly fifty writers, 
whose manuscripts were examined by the distinguished com- 
mittee appointed by the Donor, whose award has been made, 
as their certificate, here annexed, will show. 



PREMIUM AWARDED. 

The undersigned, appointed a Committee to award a pre- 
mium of one hundred dollars, offered by a benevolent indi- 
vidual, for the best Essay on the subject of Slaver}', " adapted 

(iii) 



IV PREMIUM AWARDED. 

to receive the approbation of Evangelical Christians gener- 
ally " have had under examination more than forty compet- 
ing manuscripts, a large number of them written with much 
ability. They have decided to award the prize to the author 
of the Essay entitled, " The Error and the Duty in regard to 
Slavery" whom they find, on opening the accompanying 
envelope, to be the Rev. R. B. Thurston, of Chicopee 
Falls, Mass. 

They would also commend to the attention of the public, 
two of the remaining tracts, selected by the individual who 
offered the prize, and for which he and others interested 
have given a prize of one hundred dollars each. One of 
these is entitled, " Friendly Letters to a Christian Slave- 
holder" by Rev. A. C. Baldwin, of Durham, Conn. ; the 
Other, " Is American Slavery an Institution ichich Chris- 
tianity sanctions and will perpetuate?" by Rev. Timothy 
Willis ton, of Strongs ville, Ohio. 

Asa D. Smith, 
Mark Hopkins, 
Theodore Frelinghuysen. 
May, 1857. 



CONTENTS 



PAGK 

I. The error and the duty in regard to slavery, 1 
II. Friendly letters to a christian slave-holder, 39 

III. Is AMERICAN SLAVERY AN INSTITUTION WHICH 
CHRISTIANITY SANCTIONS AND WILL PERPET- 
UATE, 99 



(V 



THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 



REGARD TO SLAVERY. 



REV. R. B. THURSTON. 



THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 

IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 



The great and agitating question of our 
country is that concerning slavery. Beneath 
the whole subject there lies of course some sim- 
ple truth, for all fundamental truth is simple, 
which will be readily accepted by patriotic and 
Christian minds, when it is clearly perceived 
and discreetly applied. It is the design of these 
pages to exhibit this truth, and to show that it 
is a foundation for a union of sentiment and 
action on the part of good men, by which, under 
the divine blessing, our threatening controver- 
sies, North and South, may be happily termi- 
nated. 

To avoid misapprehension, let it be noticed 
that we shall examine the central claim of sla- 
very, first, as a legal institution ; afterwards, the 

1 (D 



2 THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 

moral relations of individuals connected with it 
will be considered. In that examination the 
term property, as possessed in men, will be used 
in the specific sense which is given to it by 
the slave laws and the practical operation of the 
system. No other sense is relevant to the dis- 
cussion. The property of the father in the ser- 
vices of the son, of the master in the labor of 
the apprentice, of the State in the forced toil of 
the convict, is not in question. None of these 
relations creates slavery as such ; and they should 
not be allowed, as has sometimes been done, to 
obscure the argument. 

The limits of a brief tract on a great subject 
compel us to pass unnoticed many questions 
which will occur to a thoughtful mind. It is 
believed that they all find their solution in our 
fundamental positions ; and that all passages 
of the Bible relating to the general subject, when 
faithfully interpreted in their real harmony, sus- 
tain these positions. It is admitted that the 
following argument is unsound if it does not 
provide for every logical and practical exigency. 

The primary truth which is now to be estab- 
lished may be thus stated : All men are invested 
by the Creator with a common right to hold prop- 
erty in inferior things; but they have no such 
right to hold pi'operty in men. 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 3 

Christians agree that God as the Creator is 
the original proprietor of all things, and that he 
has absolute right to dispose of all things ac- 
cording to his pleasure. This right he never 
relinquishes, but asserts in his word and exer- 
cises in his providence. The Bible speaks thus : 
" The earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof, 
the world and they that dwell therein, for he hath 
founded it. We are his people and the sheep 
of his pasture " — ourselves, therefore, subject to 
his possession and disposal as the feeble flock to 
us. Even irreligious men often testify to this 
truth, confessing the hand of providence in nat- 
ural events that despoil them of their wealth. 

Now, under his own supreme control, God 
has given to all men equally a dependent and 
limited right of property. Given is the word 
repeatedly chosen by inspiration in this connec- 
tion. " The heavens are the Lord's, but the 
earth hath he given to the children of men." 
In Eden he blessed the first human pair, and 
said to them, in behalf of the race, " Replenish 
the earth and subdue it; and have dominion 
over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the 
air, and over every living thing that moveth 
upon the earth. Behold, I have given you every 
herb bearing seed which is upon the face of all 
the earth, and every tree in the which is the 



4 THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 

fruit of a tree yielding seed." This, then, is 
the original and permanent ground of man's 
title to property; and the important fact to be 
observed is the specific divine grant. The right 
of all men equally to own property is the posi- 
tive institution of the Creator. We all alike 
hold our possessions by his authentic warrant, 
his deed of conveyance. 

Let us be understood here. We are not 
educing from the Bible a doctrine which would 
level society, by giving to all men equal shares 
of property ; but a doctrine which extends equal 
divine protection over the right of every man 
to hold that amount of property which he earns 
by his own faculties, in consistency with all 
divine statutes. 

This right is indeed argued from nature ; and 
justly ; for God's revelations in nature and in 
his word coincide. It is, however, a right of so 
much consequence to the world, that, where 
nature leaves it, he incorporates it, and gives 
it the force of a law; so that in the sequel 
we can with propriety speak of it as a law, as 
well as an institution. To the believer in the 
Bible, this law is the end of argument. 

It will have weight with some minds to state 
that this position is supported by the highest 
legal authority. In his Commentaries on the 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. O 

Laws of England, Blackstone quotes the prime- 
val grant of God, and then remarks, " This is the 
only true and solid foundation of man's dominion 
over external things, whatever airy metaphysical 
notions may have been started by fanciful writers 
upon this subject. The earth, therefore, and all 
things therein, are the general property of all 
mankind, exclusive of other beings, from the 
immediate gift of the Creator." * 

It will enhance the force of this argument to 
remember that this universal right of property is 
one of what may be called a sacred trinity of 
paradisaical institutions. These institutions are 
the Sabbath, appointed in regard for our rela- 
tions to God as moral beings ; marriage, ordained 
for our welfare as members of a successive race ; 
and the right of property, conferred to meet our 
necessities as dwellers on this material globe. 
These three are the world's inheritance from lost 
Eden. They were received by the first father 
in behalf of all his posterity. They were de- 
signed for all men as men. It is demonstrable 
that they are indispensable, that the world may 
become Paradise Regained. " Property, marriage, 
and religion have been called the pillars of soci- 

* An extended passage containing the extract may be 
found conveniently in Chambers' Cyclopaedia of English 
Literature, vol. 2, p. 246. 



6 THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 

ety ; " and the first is of equal importance with the 
other two ; for all progress in domestic felicity 
and in religious culture depends on property, 
and also on the equitable distribution or posses- 
sion of property, as one of its essential condi- 
tions. Property lies in the foundation of every 
happy home, however humble ; and property 
gilds the pinnacle of every consecrated temple. 
The wise and impartial Disposer, therefore, 
makes the endowments of his creatures equal 
with their responsibilities : to all those on whom 
he lays the obligations of religion and of the 
family state, he gives the right of holding the 
property on which the dwelling and the sanctu- 
ary must be founded. It is a sacred right, a 
divine investiture, bearing the date of the crea- 
tion and the seal of the Creator. 

The blessing of this institution, like that of 
the Sabbath and of the family, has indeed been 
shattered by the fall of man ; but when God 
said to Noah and his sons, concerning the inferior 
creatures, " Into your hand are they delivered ; 
even as the green herb have I given you all 
things," it was reestablished and consecrated 
anew. The Psalmist repeated the assurance 
to the world when he wrote, " Thou madest 
him to have dominion over the works of thy 
hand ; thou hast put all things under his feet." 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 7 

We now advance to the second part of our 
proposition. Men have no such right to hold 
property in men. Since the right is from God, 
it follows immediately that they can hold in 
ownership, by a divine title, only what he has 
given. But he has not given to men, as men, a 
right of ownership in men. No one will con- 
tend for a moment that the universal grant above 
considered confers upon them mutual dominion, 
or rightful property in their species. The idea 
is not in the terms ; it is nowhere in the Bible ; 
it is not in nature ; it is repugnant to common 
sense ; it would resolve the race into the absurd 
and terrific relation of antagonists, struggling, 
each one for the mastery of his own estate in 
another, — I, for the possession of my right in 
you ; and you, for yours in me. Nay, the very 
act of entitling all men to hold property proves 
the exemption of all, by the divine will, from the 
condition of property. The idea that a man 
can be an article of property and an owner of 
property by the same supreme warrant is con- 
tradictory and absurd. 

We now have sure ground for objecting to 
the system of American slavery, as such. It is 
directly opposed to the original, authoritative in- 
stitution of Jehovah. He gives men the right to 
hold property. Slavery strips them of the divine 



8 THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 

investiture. He gives men dominion over in- 
ferior creatures. Slavery makes them share the 
subjection of the brute. That slavery does this, 
the laws of the States in which it exists abun- 
dantly declare. Slaves are " chattels," " estate 
personal." Slave-holders assembled in conven- 
tion solemnly affirm in view of northern agita- 
tion of the subject, that " masters have the same 
right to their slaves which they have to any 
other property." 

This asserted and exercised right is the vital 
principle and substance of the institution. It is 
the central delusion and transgression; and the 
evils of the system to white and black are its 
legitimate consequences. The legal and the lead- 
ing idea concerning slaves is that they are prop- 
erty : of course, the idea that they are men, in- 
vested with the rights of men, practically sinks ; 
and, from the premise that they are property, the 
conclusion is logical that they may be treated 
as property. Why should property, contrary to 
the interests of the proprietor, be exempt from 
sale, receive instruction, give testimony in court, 
hold estate, preserve family ties, be loved as the 
owner loves himself, in fine, enjoy all or any of 
the " inalienable rights " of man ? It is because 
they are held as property, that slaves are sold ; 
because they are property, families are torn 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 9 

asunder ; because they are property, instruction 
is denied them ; because they are property, the 
law, and the public sentiment that makes the 
law, crush them as men. 

We do not here call in question the mitiga- 
tions with which Christian masters temper into 
mildness the hard working of an evil system. 
Those mitigations do not, however, logically or 
morally defend slavery. Nay, they condemn it ; 
for they are practical tributes to the fact that 
the laws of humanity, not of property, are bind- 
ing in respect to the slaves. Hence they really 
show the inherent inconsistency of the idea, and 
the unrighteousness of the system which regards 
men as property. 

Notwithstanding those mitigations, the system 
itself, like every wrong system, produces char- 
acteristic evils, which can be prevented only by 
removing their cause, the false doctrine that men 
can be rightfully held in ownership. Fallen as 
man is, no prophet was needed to foretell at the 
first the dreadful facts that have been recorded 
in the bitter history of man's claim of property 
in man. Such a history must always be a scroll 
written within and without with lamentations 
and mourning and woe. Man is not a safe de- 
positary of such power. A human institution 
which subverts a divine institution, and which 



10 THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 

carries with it the assumption of a divine prerog- 
ative in constituting a new species of property, 
naturally saps the foundations of every other 
divine institution and law which stands in its 
way. Hence, for example, the fall of the domes- 
tic institution before that of slavery. 

The inherent wrongfulness of American sla- 
very as a legal and social institution is therefore 
clearly demonstrated. It formally abolishes by 
law and usage a divine institution. Hence, in 
its practical operation, it sets aside other divine 
institutions and laws. Consequently it stands 
in the same relations to the divine government 
with the abolition of the Sabbath by infidel 
France, and with the perversion of the family 
institution by the Mormon territory of Utah. 

Here the fundamental argument from the 
Bible rests. But slavery justifies itself by the 
Bible. It becomes essential, therefore, to examine 
the validness of this justification. 

There are but two possible ways of avoiding 
the conclusion that has been reached. To vindi- 
cate slavery it must be proved, first, that God has 
abolished the original institution, conferring on 
men universally the right to hold property; or, 
secondly, it must be proved, that, while he has 
by special enactments taken away from a portion 
of mankind the right to hold property, he has 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 11 

given to other men the right to hold the former as 
property. Further, to justify American slavery, 
it must be shown that these special enactments 
include the African race and the American States. 

In regard to the first point we simply remark, 
it is morally impossible that God should per- 
manently and generally abolish the original in- 
stitution concerning property ; because, as in. 
the case of its coevals, the Sabbath and mar- 
riage, the reason for it is permanent and un- 
changeable, and " lex stat dum ratio manet," the 
law stands while the reason remain?. More- 
over, there is not a word of such repeal in the 
Bible. That institution, therefore, is still a char- 
ter of rights for the children of men. Till it is 
assailed, more need not be said. 

As to the second point, we believe that care- 
ful investigation will prove conclusively, that no 
special enactments are now in force which arrest 
or modify the institutions of Eden, in regard to 
any state or any persons. It will, then, remain 
demonstrated, that the legal system of slavery 
exists utterly without warrant of the Holy Scrip- 
tures, and in defiance of the authority of the 
Creator. The word of God is throughout con- 
sistent. 

It is here freely admitted, that God can arrest 
the operation of general laws by special statutes. 



12 THE ERROR AXD THE DUTY 

He can take away from men the right to hold 
property which he has given, and, if he please, 
constitute them the property of other men. It 
is, in this respect, as it is with life. God can 
take what he gives. If, then, he has given au- 
thority to individuals or to nations to hold others 
as property, they may do so. Nay, more ; if 
their commission is imperative, they must do so. 
But such an act of God creates an exception 
to his own fundamental law, and, like all excep- 
tions, conveys its own restrictions, and proves the 
rule. It imposes no yoke, save upon those ap- 
pointed to subjugation. It confers no author- 
ity, save upon those specifically invested with it. 
They are bound to keep absolutely within the 
prescribed terms, and no others can innocently 
seize their delegated dominion. Outside of the 
excepted parties the universal law has sway un- 
impaired. It is in this instance as it is in regard 
to marriage. God permitted the patriarchs to 
multiply their wives ; but monogamy is now a 
sacred institution for the world. So the supreme 
Disposer can make a slave, or a nation of slaves ; 
and the world shall be even the more solemnly 
bound by the original institutes concerning 
property. It follows, without a chasm in the 
argument, or a doubtful step, that, when persons 
or States reduce men to the condition of chat- 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 13 

tels, without divine authorization, they are guilty 
of subverting a divine institution ; and, since it 
is the prerogative of God to determine what 
shall be property, they are chargeable with a 
presumptuous usurpation of divine prerogative, 
in making property, so far as human force and 
law can do it, of those whom Jehovah has 
created in his own image, and invested with all 
the original rights of men. 

The soundness of the principle contained in 
these remarks, both in law and in biblical inter- 
pretation, will not be questioned. In the light 
of it, let us examine briefly the justifications of 
slavery as derived from the Bible. Happily the 
principle itself saves the labor of minute and 
protracted criticism. 

We first consider the curse pronounced upon 
Canaan by Noah. Admitting all that is neces- 
sary to the support of slavery, namely, that that 
curse constituted the descendants of Canaan the 
property of some other tribe or people, upon 
whom it conferred the right of holding them as 
property, yet even so this passage does not 
justify but condemns American slavery; for 
that curse does not touch the African race: 
they are not descendants of Canaan;* and it 

* Genesis, 10th Chapter. Vide, Kitto's Cyclopaedia, for 
views in this connection. 



14 THE ERROR AXD THE DUTY 

gives no rights to American States. In later 
times the Canaanites were devoted to destruc- 
tion for their sins. The Hebrews were the agents 
appointed by Jehovah to this work of retribution. 
It was not, however, accomplished in their entire 
extermination. In the case of the Gibeonites 
it was formally commuted to servitude, and other 
nations occupying the promised land were made 
tributary. Thus the curse upon Canaan was ful- 
filled by authorized executioners of divine justice. 

What light does the whole history now throw 
upon slavery ? It is plain the curse was a judi- 
cial act of God concerning Canaan. It follows 
that conquest with extermination or servitude 
was a judgment of God, which he appointed his 
chosen people to execute. It follows further, 
that those, who, without his commission, reduce 
to bondage men who are not descendants of Ca- 
naan, do inflict a curse on those whom he has 
not cursed ; and thus virtually assume his most 
awful prerogative as the Judge of guilty nations. 

We then inquire whether the States of the 
South have received warrant for enslaving any 
portion of mankind. Has God given them the 
African race as property? Where is the com- 
mission ? The argument fails to justify modern 
slavery for the same reason identically that it 
fails to justify offensive war and conquest. God 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 15 

has not given the right — has neither proclaimed 
the curse, nor commissioned the agent of the 
curse. Christian States in America seize it, and 
lay it upon those whom he has not cursed. The 
passage of his word which has been considered 
affords them no sanction. 

We proceed to another passage. It is sup- 
posed by many to be an incontrovertible defence 
of modern slavery, that the Hebrews were au- 
thorized to buy bondmen and bondmaids of the 
heathen round about them. Let us candidly ex- 
amine this defence. 

Why were the Hebrews authorized by God in 
express terms to buy servants, and possess them 
as their " money?" Evidently because they did not 
otherwise have this authority. Human beings, as 
we have seen, were not " given " in the grant of 
property. They do not, therefore, fall within the 
scope of the general laws of property. If they 
had so fallen, the special statutes, by which the 
Hebrews purchased them, would have been as 
gratuitous as special enactments for buying ani- 
mals, trees, and minerals. Of all nations they 
only have possessed this right; for they only re- 
ceived it by special bestowment. The rest of man- 
kind have ever been prohibited from assuming it 
by fundamental laws. If ever there was a case 
in which the exception proves the rule, that case 



16 THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 

is before us ; and therefore a chasm yawns be- 
tween the premise and the conclusion defensive 
of slavery, which no exegesis and no logic can 
bridge over. 

To illustrate the strength of this argument, let 
the fact be observed, that, if it could be set aside, 
it would follow, by parity of reasoning, that the 
clergy of our country, regardless of fundamental 
laws, have right to take possession of a tenth 
part of the estates and incomes of their fellow- 
citizens, because the Levites in this manner re- 
ceived their inheritance among their brethren. 
It is plain, however, that, as in regard to other 
interests no less important than liberty or slavery, 
so also in regard to slavery itself, the special law^s 
of the Old Testament are no longer in force ; 
whence it follows that the vital doctrine of the 
system, "masters have the same right to their 
slaves which they have to any other property," 
is totally erroneous. The institution which 
claims solid foundation here is built on nothing. 

We cannot forbear to adduce an instance of 
unexceptionable testimony to the validity of this 
reasoning. In one or two famous articles on 
slavery and abolitionism, the Princeton Reper- 
tory adopts it, with another application, and says, 
" So far as polygamy and divorce were permitted 
under the old dispensation they were lawful, and 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 17 

became so by that permission; and they cease I 
to be lawful when that permission was with- 
drawn, and a new law given. That Christ did 
give a new law is abundantly evident." In the 
same manner, ' so far as ' slavery ' was permitted 
under the old dispensation it was lawful, and 
became so by that permission ; and it ceased to 
be lawful when that permission was withdrawn, 
and a new law given.' It is true, however, only 
in a qualified sense, that Christ gave " a new 
law" concerning polygamy and divorce. His 
law restored the original institution of marriage, 
as in Eden ; and this was " new " to the Jews, 
because there had been departure from it. In 
like manner the New Testament, if not the very 
words of Christ, now gives a new law concerning 
slavery in the same sense ; that is, as will ap- 
pear, in the sequel, the Christian precepts restore 
the original institution concerning property as 
well as concerning marriage. The laws which 
allowed polygamy and slavery, and therefore the 
right, passed away together. 

Here we leave the Old Testament. No other 
passages need examination ; for all consist with 
these positions. So far as that sacred volume 
gives light, the world are bound by the laws and 
have equal right to the full blessings of three di- 
vine institutions, whose foundations were laid in 
2 



18 THE ERROR AXD THE DUTY 

Paradise, and whose complete and glorious pro- 
portions will encompass the universal, millennial 
felicity. 

The defence of slavery from the New Testa- 
ment now demands brief notice. We desire to 
allow it full force, while we ask the reader's can- 
did judgment of the conclusion. 

Of course, the New Testament sanctions now 
what it sanctioned in the days of its authors. 
That must have been Ro?nan, not Hebreiv, sla- 
very; for they lived and wrote to men under 
Roman law. Besides, there is reason to believe, 
as Kitto states, that the Jews at that time held 
no slaves. In point of historic truth, it appears 
that the Mosaic law, finding slavery in existence, 
practically operated as a system of gradual eman- 
cipation for its extinction. " There is no evi- 
dence that Christ ever came in contact with sla- 
very." This sufficiently explains why he did not 
give a "new law" concerning it in specific terms. 
The occasion did not arise, as it did arise in re- 
gard to polygamy and divorce, with which he did 
come in contact. Furthermore, there was no 
need of new law, other than was actually given. 

The argument from the New Testament for 
the rightfulness of slavery is twofold, being built 
on the instructions given to masters and servants. 
It fails on both sides. 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 19 

For, first, the precepts addressed to servants 
convey no authority to national rulers or to 
private individuals to set aside the institution 
of Jehovah by reducing men to the condition 
of slaves. These precepts simply enjoin the 
conduct which Christianity required in their act- 
ual situation. They do not vindicate the law 
and usage by which they were held as property. 
This is abundantly evident in the texts them- 
selves, and more emphatically, when they are 
compared with the parallel cases. 

Christ promulgated these rules. " I say unto 
you that ye resist not evil ; but whosoever shall 
smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the 
other also. And if any man will sue thee at the 
law and take away thy coat, let him have thy 
cloak also." Does this empower States to legal- 
ize fraud and violence ? Does it transmute all 
the evil which Jesus' disciples have endured 
into righteousness of those who have inflicted 
the evil? Does it wash the crimsoned hands of 
persecutors in innocency? Does it justify the 
wilful smiter ? All men know better. No one 
contends for such exposition. Yet it is indis- 
pensable to the interpretation which finds a jus- 
tification of slavery in precepts which enjoin 
obedience on slaves. That obedience is re- 
quired on other grounds. 



20 THE ERROR AXD THE DUTY 

Another example. The New Testament ex- 
plicitly commands citizens to submit to the civil 
power. Does this sanctify the tyranny of a 
Nero or a Nicholas? In the enjoined submis- 
sion of subjects, has the despot, or the state, full 
license for edicts and acts of oppression and 
iniquity? Yet they are logically compelled to 
admit this, and thus, in theory at least, banish 
freedom from the whole earth, who find in com- 
mands addressed to servants power conferred on 
legislators and masters to make them slaves, 
that is, to hold them as property. Instead of 
this, the rights and obligations of rulers, and of 
those who claim to be owners of their fellow 
men, aie denned in a very different class of in- 
structions. 

Secondly, the instructions addressed to masters 
forbid the exercise of the right which is assumed 
in slavery. To make this clear, we observe, 
primarily, there is no passage in the New Testa- 
ment which institutes the relation of men held 
in ownership by men. There is no direct refer- 
ence to the civil laws which constituted this 
relation. They are passed by silently, as are the 
laws that established idolatry, and kindled the 
fires of persecution. Their existence is tacitly 
acknowledged in the use of the terms which des- 
ignate masters and servants ; and that is alL 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 21 

Hence those who find here an apology for sla 
are obliged to refer to secular history for the 
facts and definitions on which their argument 
rests. Accordingly, no passage in the New Tes- 
tament would be void of meaning, though slav- 
ery should cease. In this respect the Constitu- 
tion of the United States resembles the sacred 
books ; for not one word of that instrument, in- 
terpreted on just principles as the palladium of 
liberty, needs to be obliterated in the abolition 
of slavery. Furthermore, and this covers our 
position, the New Testament, disregarding the 
Roman law, refers masters exclusively to the 
law of God as their rule for the treatment of 
servants. A single citation, with which all pas- 
sages agree, is sufficient to show this. " Masters, 
give unto your servants that which is just and 
equal, knowing that ye also have a Master in 
heaven." Now, as none can find in such pre- 
cepts a right to destroy God's primary institu- 
tion concerning the family, no more can they find 
in them a right to destroy his primary and uni- 
versal institution concerning property. Stronger 
than this, the conclusion is inevitable, that the 
very precepts which are relied upon to support 
American slavery do condemn and destroy it; 
for the law of God, by which they bind masters, 
ordaining from Eden what is just and equal 



22 THE ERROR AXD THE DUTY 

between men, abolishes the fundamental and 
central law of the system* 

* Col. 4:1; " Ye masters, give unto your servants that 
■which is just and equal." That is, act towards them on the 
principles of justice and equity. Justice requires that all 
their rights, as men, as husbands, and as parents, should be 
regarded. And these rights are not to be determined by the 
civil law, but by the law of God. . . . But God concedes noth- 
ing to the master beyond what the law of love allows. Paul 
requires for servants not only what is strictly just, but 
77]v iGOTrjTa. What is that? Literally, it is equality. This 
is not only its signification, but its meaning. Servants are 
to be treated by their masters on the principles of equal- 
ity. Not that they are to be equal with their masters in 
authority or station or circumstances ; but that they are to 
be treated as having, as men, as husbands, and as parents, 
equal rights with their masters. It is just as great a sin to 
deprive a servant of the just recompense for his labor, or to 
keep him in ignorance, or to take from him his wife or child, 
as it is to act thus towards a free man. This is the equality 
which the law of God demands, and on this principle the final 
judgment is to be administered. Christ will punish the mas- 
ter for defrauding the servant as severely as he will punish 
the servant for robbing his master. The same penalty will 
be inflicted for the violation of the conjugal or parental 
rights of the one as of the other. For, as the apostle adds, 
there is no respect of persons with him. At his bar the ques- 
tion will be, « What was done ? * not " Who did it '? " Paul 
carries this so far as to apply the principle not only to the 
acts, but to the temper of masters. They are not only to 
act towards their servants on the principles of justice and 
equity, but are to avoid threatening. This includes all mani- 



IX REGARD TO SLAVERY. 2o 

It is argued, indeed, that slavery is right, be- 
cause masters, as well as fathers and rulers, may- 
require obedience. The argument fails utterly ; 
for there is at the foundation no analogy in the 
cases. The family and the State are divine 
institutions, having sanction in the Bible ; but 
slavery subverts a divine institution. Fathers 
and rulers, as such, have duties and rights suit- 
able to the relations they sustain by the will of 
God. Masters, as such, have no rights ; for their 
relation, as holding property in men, is contrary 
to his will. Their duty, to which they are 
bound by the solemn consideration that he is 
their Master, is practically to restore to their ser- 
vants the rights which he confers upon all ; for 
nothing less than this can be just and equal in 
his sight. 

This view discloses the harmony of the whole 
Bible concerning slavery ; and, in the light of the 
two Testaments, the institution stands as a le- 
galized violation of the positive will of Jehovah. 

testation of contempt and ill temper, or undue seventy. All 
this is enforced by the consideration that masters have a 
Master in heaven, to whom they are responsible for their 
treatment of their servants. . . . Believers will act in con- 
formity with the Gospel in this. And the result of such 
obedience, if it could become general, would be, that first 
the evils of slavery, and then slavery itself, would pass away 
naturally, and as healthfully as children cease to be minors. 
.Prof. Hodge's Commentary. 



24 THE ERROR AXD THE DUTY 

We now condense the whole argument into 
its briefest form, in the following syllogisms. 

The entire right of men to hold property is 
given by the Creator. He gives to American 
States and citizens no right to hold property in 
men. Therefore they have no such right. 

Again. An institution is sinful, winch, with- 
out divine warrant, holds property in men, thus 
assuming a divine prerogative, and subverting a 
divine institution. American slavery does this. 
Therefore it is a sinful institution. 

The purpose of this tract now introduces a 
now series of topics. The argument demands 
its application ; and the exigencies of the times 
present momentous questions, which it must 
answer. 

Hitherto we have spoken of the system of 
slavery. We come now to persons connected 
with it. Because the system is sinful, the ques- 
tion immediately occurs, who are chargeable 
with the sin ; for there is no sin without sinners. 
The answer is obvious. They are chargeable 
who founded it, and all who wilfully implicate 
themselves with it. Practically, they are always 
chargeable who adopt it as their own in theory 
and practice, who support it in the State, conse- 
crate it in the Church, and labor for its exten- 
sion. They are chargeable, for they bring heresy 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 25 

into creeds, unrighteousness into legislation, and 
crime into popular usage. If they are masters, 
they stand in the same moral relations with per- 
secutors and tyrannical rulers, guilty for all per- 
sonal injuries they inflict under color of unjust 
laws ; and, whether masters or not, they are 
guilty for exerting their influence to sustain 
laws which set aside the authority of God, and 
withhold the rights he has given. Such men 
are accountable to God and to society for de- 
liberate, organized, aggressive iniquity. The 
" organic sin " of the State is then sin, the sin 
of each in his own measure ; for they are the 
individuals who determine the acts and the 
character of the slave-holding State as such. 

But are there no exceptions among slave- 
holders? We trust there are many. There is a 
plain distinction between wicked laws and the 
personal acts of men who live under those laws. 
Some may approve them, and use or abuse them 
to the injury of their fellow men. Others may 
disapprove them, and refuse, by means of them, 
to do or justify a wrong. Christians may be- 
come in a legal sense owners of slaves, while 
they heartily deprecate the system of oppression, 
while they are ready to unite with good men in 
feasible and wise measures for its removal, and 
while they obey the Christian precepts towards 



26 THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 

their servants, rendering unto them what is just 
and equal to men and brethren in Christ. Such 
Christians and such men do not hold slaves in 
the sense which God forbids ; and they cannot 
be charged with the wickedness of laws by which 
they, as well as the slaves, are oppressed. On 
their estates a higher law than that of slavery 
has sway. To them their slaves, though legally 
property, are morally and actually men. The 
Bible sustains their position. They are the Phil- 
emons to whom Paul gives fellowship, and Ones- 
imus returns, not as a slave, but a brother be- 
loved. In the trials of their situation they should 
receive the cordial sympathy of Christians every- 
where. It is, indeed, to their sound convictions 
and their political influence the world must look, 
in part at least, for the ultimate, peaceful extinc- 
tion of American slavery. Without them, what 
would the South become ? With the Scriptures 
in our hand we earnestly say to them, " Throw 
the weight of your influence against unright- 
eous laws, fulfil to servants the law of God, and 
you shall have the sympathy and confidence of 
good men everywhere. Nay, more ; you, with 
their help, and they with your help, will confine 
the spreading curse, till, with God's blessing, it 
shall cease ; and Christian and civilized man 
shall have no more communion with it." 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 27 

These discriminations answer certain ecclesi- 
astical questions, which have occasioned much 
perplexity and discord. When properly applied, 
they take away whatever support a wicked insti- 
tution has found by leaning upon the Church; at 
the same time they award to consistent Chris- 
tians what is due to them by the religion of 
Jesus. If it shall be said, there will be practical 
difficulty in applying these discriminations, it is 
sufficient to answer, it will be less than the diffi- 
culty of disregarding them. 

The question now arises, what can be done 
for the restriction and ultimate extinction of sla- 
very as it is ; for, since it is sinful, Christianity 
and patriotism declare it should be restrained 
and abolished. 

First. The extension of slavery can and should 
be prevented by the Federal Government. The 
Scriptures have shown us, that the people in their 
sovereignty have not the right to create a slave 
State or a slave. Of course, the legislators and 
presidents, who receive in trust the power which 
emanates from the people, have no such right. 
If the Constitution assumed to confer this power, 
it would be the first national duty to amend that 
instrument in this particular. There is no power 
on earth competent to set aside either of the 
Creator's original institutions for man. But, ac- 



28 THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 

cording to the sound and established principle of 
strict construction, the Constitution as it is does 
not create slavery, or even acknowledge its exist- 
ence, except by inference. Hence there is no 
legal objection to the measure which religion her- 
self ordains. The religious and the political obli- 
gations of all citizens and all legislators coincide 
to protect, under the jurisdiction of Congress, the 
right of every man to be exempt from the condi- 
tion of property, and to enjoy the property which 
he honestly earns. Thus the question concerning 
slavery and the territories is morally settled by 
divine authority; and to this no real objection can 
be made, except by that great interest, whose ex- 
istence is inherently unrighteous and irreligious. 

Secondly. In the slave States, legislation 
should restore to the enslaved population the 
primitive rights which God has given to all men, 
establishing for them, on humane and Christian 
principles, such relations as are suitable to their 
condition of poverty, ignorance, and depend- 
ence, and are adapted to secure at once their 
improvement and the general welfare. 

This is the logical .conclusion to be derived 
from the premises. As the central wrong of sla- 
very consists in making men articles of property 
by law, the rectification is to Lift from them by 
law the curse of the false and irreligious doctrine, 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 29 

that they can be rightfully held as property. 
Thus the axe is laid to the root of the tree. 

This is also the conclusion to which we are 
forced by other moral principles bearing on the 
case. For men to receive services of men is 
right. Accordingly, the New Testament allows 
masters to receive services of those who are 
slaves in the sense of human law; but at the 
same time the sacred book requires masters, with 
all who employ labor, to make the recompenses 
which are just and equal towards men ; for sla- 
very is not right; and legislators, on their re- 
sponsibility to the Ruler of nations, are bound to 
adjust the laws in harmony with the first princi- 
ples of individual and moral obligation. 

Furthermore, this is the only practical conclu- 
sion. By inevitable necessity, the slaves, as a 
body, must remain on the soil of their bondage. 
Only exceptional cases of removal can occur. 
They are the laborers of the South ; and no State 
will, or can, or is bound, to remove its laborers. 
It is simply bound to protect and treat them with 
Christian equity and kindness. Banishment of 
them would be injustice and cruelty, violating 
perhaps no less than restoring divine rights. 
Moreover, no practicable means of removing them 
have ever been seriously proposed ; and, till they 
shall be, the point needs no discussion. 



30 THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 

But the question may be raised, " Are the slaves 
to endure their present wrongs until the laws 
shall be thus renewed, or perhaps forever ?" We 
reply, in showing how slave-holders can cease 
from guilty connection with slavery; we have 
also shown how the situation of the slaves be- 
comes one of practical righteousness, before the 
laws can be readjusted ; and for this great obli- 
gation of the body politic, sufficient time must 
be allowed. Moral principles do not exact 
natural impossibilities. The elevation of op- 
pressed millions can be accomplished only in 
harmony with great natural and social, as well 
as ethical laws, which the wisdom of God has 
ordained. 

It remains therefore, that, for a period of which 
no man can see the end, the slaves must, in most 
cases, dwell within the present boundaries ; but 
it is incumbent on the citizens and legislators 
of the South to institute immediate measures for 
restoring to them the inviolable rights of men. 
So long as they continue, by the necessities of the 
case, in the relation of servants and laborers, mas- 
ters should deal with them according to the rules 
of humane and Christian equity, paying to them 
in suitable ways then* just earnings, holding sa- 
cred their family ties, and securing to them the 
privileges of education and religion. Meanwhile, 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 31 

the legislatures of the several States, by wise 
enactments, should cooperate with masters in 
training their servile population for the position 
which the Creator designed for men. 

When these things shall come to pass, a con- 
sideration, in which many good men have sought 
relief in regard to slavery, will have multiplied 
force. The providential wisdom of God, in 
bringing millions of the children of Africa from a 
land of pagan darkness and violence to a land of 
freedom and Christianity, will shine with new 
lustre, when they shall receive from American 
hands, together with true religion, every divine 
right, and shall thus be qualified and enabled to 
convey to the dark habitations of their fathers 
the infinite blessings of enlightened liberty and 
of the gospel of eternal salvation. 

These things are practicable. So long as 
" righteousness exalteth a nation," a great, free, 
and Christian people can do what they should 
do ; and thus only can they secure, under the di- 
vine blessing, their own highest prosperity and 
glory. To prove this would be simply to repeat 
the familiar facts which exhibit the legitimate ef- 
fects of slavery on general intelligence, enterprise, 
and virtue. 

But what shall produce the true and wide 
spread public sentiment, which is indispensable 
to usher in so radical a change in the laws and 



32 THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 

institutions of proud and powerful States ? Truth 
must accomplish this great work — the truth 
that our Creator does not place those who bear 
his image in bondage to their fellow men as 
property, but invests them with a common and 
inviolable right of dominion over inferior things. 
The vivid light which this truth sheds on the 
social relations of men has been extinguished at 
the South; and it has been dimmed at the 
North. In every right way and in every place, 
therefore, it should be made to shine again unob- 
scured. Expounders should bring it forth from 
the Holy Oracles; for Jehovah has hallowed it 
there, and made it equal in authority with the 
Sabbath. The press should publish it ; for it is 
the function of the press to convey unceasingly 
to the public mind whatever will establish and 
crown the public integrity and welfare. All men 
should seal it in their hearts ; for it is the divine 
rule and bond of brotherhood in the universal 
dominion. It surrounds them with protected 
families, and builds their safe firesides and their 
altars of worship. 

The question arises here, can general agree- 
ment be expected in regard to this primary truth, 
and measures which legitimately proceed from 
it. It is to be supposed there are men in whose 
hearts there is no fear of God or love of their 
fellow beings. With such men these views 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 33 

may be powerless ; but for men of Christian 
principle, we are confident they show a common 
foundation for united sentiments and efforts. 

There is now a general, practical, vital con- 
sent that government and society should respect 
the divine institutions of the family and the 
Sabbath. Beneath all superficial strifes and ir- 
relevant issues, there is the same sure ground 
for a living and earnest agreement, that govern- 
ment and society should respect the equal and 
coeval institution of the right of property. 

Christian and conservative men can unite in 
the proposed measures and the truth which ap- 
points them ; for they desire to preserve only 
what is right. Christian and progressive men 
can unite in them ; for they desire to abolish 
only what is wrong. Politics can approve them ; 
for they are constitutional and patriotic. Phi- 
lanthropy can be satisfied with them ; for they 
promise all that in the nature of the case can 
be promised for the early relief of the slaves. Re- 
ligion sanctions them ; for they restore her own 
institutions. Good men of the South can unite 
in them with those of the North ; for they have 
equal authority North and South. They proffer 
only that moral aid which great communities, 
sharing common interests and responsibilities, 
should render and receive with intimate and 
3 



34 THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 

cordial confidence. They honor the sovereignty 
of proud and jealous States; for each of them, 
exercising the power which springs from its own 
people in its own way, will discharge its politi- 
cal obligations to all within its boundaries. 

A few years or even months of combined 
efforts will suffice to convey this truth with vital 
energy to millions of minds and hearts. In due 
time it will manifest its efficacy in the public 
sentiment and public policy. We trust in its 
power. It is invincible ; it will be victorious ; 
for it is from God. Its absence from the popu- 
lar and legislative mind well explains many of 
the evils that have been precipitated upon the 
nation. Its future prevalence, under divine 
mercy, will arrest the progress of events which 
would be, as we judge, not remedy, but retribu- 
tive destruction, on account of slavery. 

This leads us to the final question. Are the 
principles and measures advocated in this tract 
or their equivalents, with the contemplated re- 
sult, essential to the welfare of our country ? 
We are compelled to believe so. 

We present, for the consideration of citizens 
and statesmen, this fact. In harmony with that 
law of fitness which pervades the Creator's works, 
all men are constituted with a nature correspond- 
ing with the dominion they have received. They 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 35 

feel that they have a right to hold property, and 
should not be held as property. Slaves feel this. 
Masters often show that they feel it. They who 
make laws for slavery, North and South, show- 
that they feel it. The little property which 
slaves are often allowed to possess, so far from 
furnishing apology for slavery, is an unwitting 
tribute to the living principle that destroys the 
system. Here is a philosophical demonstration 
that slavery cannot stand in perpetuity. This 
vital element in human nature, to which a divine 
institution itself is but an index, is subterranean 
fire beneath the pyramid of oppression. Though 
long crushed and silent, it will not always sleep. 
Do men expect to control forever, by law and 
force, that sense of rights which burns inextin- 
guishable in every human breast, which God 
himself kindled in Eden? As well pile rocks 
on volcanoes to suppress earthquakes. 

" Vital in every part, 
It can but by annihilating die." 

In this light, it is no prediction to say, if slavery 
survives to consummate its own results it will 
destroy our country. 

The great political and religious problem of 
the slave-holding States, on which their welfare 
really depends, is not, how shall we extend sla- 



36 THE ERROR AND THE DUTY 

very ? but, how shall we lay legal foundation for 
the rights of our servile population as men ? Un- 
less it shall be anticipated and prevented, by re- 
storing to them the dominion which the Creator 
bestowed, a day is as sure to come on natural 
principles as the sun to rise, when the masses of 
human property will assert for themselves the in- 
destructible rights of their being. Generations 
may not see it ; but woe betides the States im- 
plicated in this oppression, when that day shall 
dawn ; and the longer it tarries the greater the 
woe. 

To our mind, the statesmen are infatuated who 
do not in their policy regard this universal sense 
of rights. It is this which is now making so bit- 
ter conflict on the prairies of Kansas. It will 
always make conflict, till slavery expires. 

In connection with the general welfare, there is 
another consideration, which we solemnly urge 
upon every man who respects the Bible. It is 
the displeasure of God for slavery. He gave the 
rights which it denies; and he will assuredly 
vindicate his own institutions. It would contra- 
dict his word and history, which is but the story 
of his providence, to suppose that he will perpet- 
ually allow myriads of men, in this land of light, 
to hold as property other myriads and even mill- 
ions of their fellow men and fellow Christians, 



IN REGARD TO SLAVERY. 37 

whom he has endowed, as bearing his own im- 
age, with equal rights. With Jefferson we have 
reason to tremble for our country, when we be- 
hold her support of slavery and remember that 
God is just. France abolished the Sabbath; and 
thrones have gone down in blood. America 
may abolish another divine institution ; and for 
this her proud States may be convulsed. The 
previous topic shows, indeed, that God has so 
constituted the social elements of this world, that 
a great wrong, like slavery, ultimately provides 
for its own retribution. The oppressor himself 
treasures up the vials of wrath for Him who tak- 
eth vengeance. 

In view of all the considerations which have 
now passed before our minds, is it too much to 
believe, that the diffusion of kindly and scriptu- 
ral sentiments, with the blessing of heaven pro- 
ducing general agreement in principles and 
measures, must be the means of our country's 
salvation from the guilt and perils of slavery ? 
If it is not extended, misguided, infatuated men 
may, indeed, threaten to dissolve the Union. Still 
we fear that extension most ; for religion teaches 
us to fear God more than man. It allows us but 
this alternative, to keep his commandments, and 
trust that he will make the wrath of man to 
praise him. We hold that national righteous- 



38 THE ERROR AND THE DUTY, ETC. 

ness in his sight, " first pure, then peaceable," is 
better and safer than union and slavery with his 
frown. Let justice be done, and the heavens 
will not fall. 

Whatever purposes God may conceal in the 
cloudy future, present duties are ours. He seals 
them in his word. Notwithstanding all the heats 
and perversions of parties and interests, we trust 
there will yet be a single voice of our nation's 
good men. Citizens will speak the truth, legis- 
lators will enact the truth, churches will hallow 
the truth, vital to civilization and Christianity, 
that, by Jehovah's will, man is not the property of 
man. Then, under the benediction of our Father 
in heaven, all his children in mutual protection 
and benevolence will enjoy their property, their 
homes, and their Sabbath; and he will more 
richly bless the land of the free and the just. 



FRIENDLY LETTERS 



TO 



A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 



BY 
/ 

REV. A. C. BALDWIN. 



(39) 



LETTER I. 

INTRODUCTION. — SOUTHERN COURTESY AND HOSPITALITY. — 
CHARACTERISTICS OP THE SOUTH AND NORTH. — NO ESSENTIAL 
DIFFERENCE AT HEART. — THEY SHOULD UNDERSTAND EACH 
OTHER BETTER. — A FREE INTERCHANGE OF SENTIMENT DE- 
SIRABLE. — SINCERE PATRIOTISM AND PIETY COMMON TO 
BOTH. — THESE AN EFFECTUAL SAFEGUARD TO OUR UNION 
AND GOOD-FELLOWSHIP. 

My dear Christian" Brother, — I embrace 
the first moment at my command since leaving 
your pleasant home, to express the gratification 
afforded me by my recent visit to the " Sunny 
South." The kind hospitality and polite atten- 
tions shown me by yourself and other Christian 
friends, during my recent interesting sojourn 
with you, will ever be gratefully remembered. 
I had previously heard " by the hearing of the 
ear" of the open, frank warm-heartedness and 
generous impulses of southern people, but now I 
can fully appreciate them. The lessons taught 
us by experience, whether they be pleasant or 
painful, are the most profitable, and are most 

(41) 



42 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

deeply engraven upon the memory. If there are 
any persons who think or speak lightly of the 
reputed complaisance and Christian courtesy of 
those who live south of " Mason and Dixon's 
line," I have only to say to them, — go and make 
the acquaintance of those families which give the 
tone and character to society there, and enjoy 
the hospitalities which they almost force upon 
you with so much politeness and delicacy as to 
make you feel that by sharing them you are 
conferring rather than receiving a favor, and 
your skepticism on this point will be happily 
and effectually removed. 

You will not understand me, my dear sir, as 
implying that our southern brethren have really 
more heart than we at the North, although there 
seems to be " prima facie" evidence in your 
favor; at least, so far as polite and generous 
attention to strangers is concerned. In this last 
particular, you are constantly teaching us im- 
portant lessons. Still, I contend that the Nor- 
therner has as large and generous a soul, when 
you get at it, as anybody. We have hearts 
which beat warm and true, but our cautious 
habits and constitutional temperament (phleg- 
matic sometimes) conceal them from view; 
whereas you carry yours throbbing with gen- 
erous emotions in your hands, exposed to the 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 43 

gaze of everybody. The Southron is artless 
and impulsive, as well as noble ; the Northerner 
is no less noble, but having been taught more 
frequently the doctrine of " expediency " than his 
southern brother, he stops and "calculates" 
when, and in what circumstances, it is best to 
exhibit his whole character. In both cases, the 
pure gold is there ; but in the former it lies upon 
the surface or in the alluvial, while in the latter 
it is often imbedded deep in the quartz-rock ; — 
it requires some labor to get it out, but the ulti- 
mate yield is most rich and abundant. 

It is very desirable that a greater degree of 
social intercourse be kept up between the North 
and South. We are brethren of one great 
family, and there is no good reason why this 
family should not be a united and happy one. 
To a considerable extent it is so. It is true we 
do not all think alike on every subject, and 
some of these subjects are of vast importance, 
and intimately connected with our prosperity 
and happiness. We need to understand each 
other better, and to this end there should be 
more intimacy, and a frequent and free inter- 
change of views ; — not for strife and debate, but 
for mutual edification and enlightenment. There 
was probably never a family of brothers, however 
strong their love for each other, whose views 



44 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

of domestic policy were exactly alike ; but there 
need be no lack of fraternal confidence and har- 
mony for all that. There are certain great 
fundamental principles which underlie every 
thing else, and form the basis of the family 
compact. These principles are filial reverence, 
fraternal affection, love for home, and a watchful 
jealousy of aught that can in the least interfere 
with the happiness or reputation of their beloved 
family circle. Falling back upon these principles 
to preserve good-will and harmony, they are not 
in the least afraid to discuss those topics on 
which there is an honest difference of opinion; 
on the contrary, they take pleasure in doing so, 
for the result is a strengthening of the ties which 
bind them to each other, and a modification and 
partial blending of opinions that seemed antag- 
onistic. 

Thus it should be in our great political 
and religious brotherhood. The North and 
South have each their peculiar views of what 
pertains to their own interests, and the interests 
of the great family of the Republic. But do not 
let us stand at a distance and look at each other 
with an eye of jealousy because of these differ- 
ences. Surely we can meet as fellow-citizens, 
and discuss matters of common interest, and the 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 45 

interests of common humanity, without losing 
our temper or engendering any ill feeling or fam- 
ily discord. 

It is affirmed by some, that there are certain 
subjects, at least one, of so peculiar and delicate 
a nature as to forbid discussion, lest the result 
should be heart-burnings, alienation, and perhaps 
disunion in our happy fraternity. I cannot for a 
moment admit the sentiment. It is an ungener- 
ous reflection upon the courtesy, Christian can- 
dor, piety, and good-sense, both of the North and 
South. I hold that good citizens and good 
Christians can, if they will, discuss any subject 
without giving the least occasion for offence, or 
endangering that compact which so happily 
binds us together. As it is in the family circle, 
there are certain great principles most dear to us 
all, on which we can fall back, and which, if we 
are true to ourselves and to them, will prove effi- 
cient safeguards to our temper and good-fellow- 
ship. The first of these is Patriotism. We 
have a common country, and we love it, and we 
love each other for our country's sake. We are 
children of a common mother, whose kind arms 
have encircled us, and whose bosom has nour- 
ished us bounteously and with impartiality, and 
God forbid, that, as wayward, ungrateful children, 



46 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

we should wring her maternal heart with an- 
guish by our unfraternal conduct toward each 
other. We shall not do it, — either at the North 
or at the South. We are true patriots, and in 
our very differences, love of country come in as 
an important element to shape and modify our 
opinions ; and while we may be adopting differ- 
ent theories, we are conscientiously seeking the 
same end, namely, the greatest good of our be- 
loved country. 

The second is piety. We love our country 
well, but we love our Saviour more, and for his 
sake we will love and treat each other as brethren, 
and not fall out by the way because we may not 
see through the same optic-glasses. W r e will 
cheerfully hear what each has to say on what- 
ever pertains to Christian morals and practice. 
There are thousands of sincere, warm-hearted 
Christians, whose love to Christ raises them 
immeasurably above sectionalism and prejudice, 
and who daily inquire, " what is truth ? " and 
" what is duty ? " and they entertain that " char- 
ity " which " suffereth long and is kind ; is not 
easily provoked, thinketh no evil, rejoiceth not in 
iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth ; beareth all 
things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, en- 
dureth all things ; " and " never faileth." When 
this love is in exercise, Christian brethren may 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 47 

open their hearts freely to each other on any 
subject, whether it be " for doctrine, or reproof, 
or for instruction in righteousness." 

Whatever may be true of others, I hope that 
you and I will be able to demonstrate to the 
world, that, although one of us lives at the North 
and the other at the South, yet we can commu- 
nicate with each other unreservedly on an almost 
interdicted topic, with mutual kind feelings, if 
not to edification. 

Respectfully and fraternally, 

Yours, &c. 



LETTER II. 

A DIFFICULT AND DELICATE SUBJECT PROPOSED. — AGITATION OF 
IT UNAVOIDABLE. — CHRISTIANS NORTH AND SOUTH SHOULD 
GIVE THE DISCUSSION OF IT A RIGHT DIRECTION. — "\VE ARE ALL 
INTERESTED IN THE ISSUE. — NORTHERN DISCLAIMERS. 

My dear Christian Brother, — In my last 
I intimated that I hoped you and I, by our cor- 
respondence, would be able to furnish the world 
a practical illustration of good-nature and kind 
feeling in the discussion of a subject that has 
been a fruitful source of trouble and unchristian 
invective. You have already anticipated my 
theme — it is Domestic Slavery. It must be 
confessed that this is the most difficult and deli- 
cate of all topics to be agitated by a Northerner 
and a Southerner, and yet I have the fullest con- 
fidence that neither of us will give or take of- 
fence. I need offer you no apology for calling 
your attention to this subject at the present time. 
Not only is it a theme of vast importance in 
itself, involving, either directly or indirectly, in- 

(48) 



FRIENDLY LETTERS, ETC. 49 

terests most deai to you and to me, and to every- 
one who has at heart the welfare of his country 
and his race, but it is a subject that must be dis- 
cussed, — there is no avoiding it, however much 
you or I or other individuals may desire it. It 
has come before the public mind in such a man- 
ner as peremptorily to demand the attention of 
every Christian and every patriot. Whether we 
approve or deprecate the peculiar causes that 
have made this topic so prominent in our coun- 
try, both North and South, we have to take things 
as they are, and turn them to the best possible 
account Politicians and demagogues are all 
discussing American slavery, and will continue 
to do so for the purpose of 'forwarding their own 
favorite schemes; and any attempt to silence 
them would be as futile as an effort to ar- 
rest the gulf-stream in its course. It remains 
only for brethren, both at the South and 
North, to take up the subject as we find it 
brought to our hands in the inscrutable provi- 
dence of God, and, under the guidance of his 
Spirit, given in answer to our prayers, take a 
truly Christian view of some of its leading feat- 
ures, and then inquire, What is duty ? I think 
you will not claim, with some of your southern 
friends, that slavery is a subject with which we at 
the North " have nothing to do." As patriots, we 
4 



50 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

have something to do with every thing that af- 
fects the interests of our common country ; and 
as Christians, we sustain responsibilities which 
we cannot shake off toward all our brethren of 
the human family, whether it be at the North or 
South — whether they be bond or free. u Have 
we not all one Father? Hath not one God 
created us ? " " We are many members, but one 
body, and whether one member suffer all the 
members suffer with it ; or one member be hon- 
ored, all the members rejoice with it." 

Your candor will not impute to me any un- 
kind or improper motive in entering upon this 
discussion ; and you will permit me, in the outset, 
to enter a few disclaimers, in order that you may 
be the better able to appreciate what I have to 
say. 

In the first place, it is not my design to throw 
down the glove for the purpose of enlisting you, 
or any of your friends, in a controversy; this 
would be an unpleasant and profitless undertak- 
ing. 

Nor is it to advocate the doctrine, that sustain- 
ing the legal relation of master to a slave for a 
longer or shorter time is in all possible cases sin. 
T will admit that there may be circumstances in 
which the relation may subsist without any 
moral delinquency whatever; as, for instance, 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 51 

persons may become slaveholders in the eye of 
the law without their own consent, as by heir- 
ship ; they sometimes become so voluntarily to 
befriend a fellow-creature in distress, to prevent 
his being sold away from his wife and family ; 
persons sometimes purchase slaves for the sole 
purpose of emancipating them. In these, and 
other circumstances which might be mentioned, 
no reasonable man either North or South would 
ever think of pronouncing the relation a sinful 
one. 

Nor is it my design to question the conscien- 
tiousness or piety of all slaveholders at the South, 
both among the laity and clergy. Whoever 
makes the sweeping assertion, that "no slave- 
holder can be a child of God," gives fearful 
evidence that he himself is deficient in that 
" charity " which " hopeth all things." There is 
an obvious distinction between those who hold 
slaves for merely selfish purposes and regard 
them as chattels, and those who repudiate this 
system, and regard them as men having in com- 
mon with themselves human rights, and would 
gladly emancipate them were thore not legal 
obstacles, and could they do it consistently with 
their welfare, temporal and eternal. 

Nor is it my purpose to advocate immediate, 
universal, unconditional emancipation without 



52 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

regard to circumstances. This doctrine is not 
held by the great mass of northern Christians. 
There are, no doubt, some cases where imme- 
diate emancipation would inflict sad calamities, 
both upon the slaves themselves and the com- 
munity. The opinions of northern men have 
often been misunderstood and misrepresented 
on this subject. The ground that calm, reflect- 
ing opponents of slavery take, is, that slave- 
holders should at once cease in their own minds 
to regard their slaves as chattels to be bought 
and sold and worked for mere profit, and that 
they should take immediate measures for the 
full emancipation of every one, as soon as may 
be consistent with his greatest good, and that of 
the community in which he lives. 

This, it is true, is virtually immediate eman- 
cipation ; for it is at once giving up the chattel 
principle, and no longer regarding servants as 
property to be bought and sold. It is to act on 
the Christian principle of impartial love, doing 
to them and with them, as, in a change of cir- 
cumstances, we would have them do to and 
with us. This does immediately abolish, as it 
should do, the main thing in slavery, and brings 
those who are now bondmen into the common 
brotherhood of human beings, to be treated, not 
as chattels and brutes, but on Christian princi- 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 53 

pies, according to the exigencies of their condi- 
tion as ignorant, degraded, and dependent 
human beings, "endowed, however, by their 
Creator with certain inalienable rights, among 
which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happi- 
ness," which rights should be acknowle dged. and 
with the least possible delay be granted. 

Nor is it my design to reproach my southern 
brethren as being to blame for the origin of 
slavery in these United States. Slavery was 
introduced into this country by our fathers, who 
have long been sleeping in their graves, and the 
North, if they did not as extensively, yet did as 
truly, and in many cases did as heartily, par- 
ticipate in it, as the South ; so that, in respect to 
the origin of American slavery, we have not a 
word to say, nor a stone to cast. And besides, 
our mother country must come in and share 
with our fathers to no small extent in the wrong 
of introducing domestic slavery to these colonies. 
Happily, as we think, slavery was virtually abol- 
ished at the North by our ancestors of a pre- 
ceding generation ; but for their act we are en- 
titled to no credit. Your ancestors omitted to 
do this ; but for their omission you are deserving 
of no blame. We would never forget, that 
slavery was entailed upon our southern brethren, 
and for this entailment they are no more respon- 



54 FRIENDLY LETTERS, ETC. 

sible than for the blood that circulates in their 
veins. 

If you will be so kind as to keep these dis- 
claimers in mind, I think you will better under- 
stand and appreciate what I shall hereafter say 
on the subject. With the kindest wishes for 
you and yours, I remain, in the best of bonds, 
Your Christian Brother. 



LETTER III. 

The real subject. — not to be confounded with ancient 
servitude. — nor to be judged of by isolated cases. 
— northern men competent as others to determine its 
true character. — slavery ignores our declaration of 
independence. — is inconsistent with our constitution. 

My dear Friend and Brother, — I propose 
in this and subsequent letters to take a brief, can- 
did view of some of the prominent characteristics 
of American slavery. I speak of servitude, not 
as it existed in patriarchal times, for that is 
essentially a distinct matter. While it had some 
things in common with American slavery, there 
was so much that was dissimilar in the relation 
of master and servant, that analogy is in a great 
measure destroyed. 

Neither do I speak of slavery as I saw it de- 
veloped on your plantation, and on those of your 
immediate neighbors. When I went to the 
South, I confess I went with strong preposses- 
sions, (prejudices if you choose so to call them,) 

(55) 



56 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

against the " peculiar institution." I regarded it 
an evil, and only an evil. But while my general 
views of the legitimate workings of the system 
remain unchanged, candor compels me to admit, 
that, if all slaves were as well cared for, as kindly 
treated, as well instructed, and were they all as 
contented and happy as yours ; and, especially, 
were there no evils incident to the system greater 
than I saw with you, I would simply divest 
slavery of its odious name, and it would virtually 
be slavery no longer. The plantations at the 
South would then, perhaps, with some propriety 
be denominated communities of intelligent, hap- 
py, Christian peasants. And yet it is slavery, as it 
really takes away inalienable rights. Would to 
God that slavery as it exists with you were a fair 
illustration of the system. But alas ! it is not. 
Perhaps you may say that " it is impossible for 
a northern man to speak of slavery so as to do the 
subject justice." You may indeed know more 
and better than we do about the state and con- 
dition of the slaves. But in some respects, where 
great principles are involved, we at the North are 
more competent than you, for our judgment is 
less liable to be biased by self-interest ; and in 
my remarks I shall confine myself chiefly to 
those points on which a northern man is at least 
as well qualified to speak as a slaveholder. 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 57 

What, then, are some of the prominent charac- 
teristics of American slavery as a system ? 

First, Slavery ignores and repudiates the foun- 
dation-stone on which rests our renowned Decla- 
ration of Independence. That document, for 
more than three fourths of a century, has been 
the boast and glory of America. It is the plat- 
form on which our noble ancestors planted their 
feet, with a consciousness that they stood on 
the eternal principles of truth and justice. To 
maintain these principles, relying on God for 
aid, they pledged to each other "their lives, their 
fortunes, and their sacred honor." Our fathers 
knew that they were right, and, to carry out the 
principles embodied in this Declaration, many of 
them cheerfully poured out their heart's blood to 
defend the " unalienable rights " of humanity. 

Now let us turn our attention to the founda- 
tion paragraph of this memorable Declaration ; — 
I do not mean in that general way in which it is 
often read, but minutely and particularly ; — let 
us calmly look at it in its full import, and not 
shrink back and avert our eyes on account of a 
foreboding that we shall be led to conclusions 
which we would be glad to avoid. 

" We hold these truths to be self-evident ; — that 
all men are created equal ; that they are endowed 
by their Creator with certain unalienable rights ; 



58 FMEXDLY LETTERS 

that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit 
of happiness." 

These significant words are inscribed upon the 
scroll of our nation's history, and there they 
will remain till time shall be no longer. They 
need no glossary or explanation. He who runs 
may read them, and he who reads can understand 
them. The sentiment they embody it is impos- 
sible to mistake ; it stands out in bold relief, like 
the sun in the heavens. It is, that every man 
has received, from a higher than earthly power, a 
charter, which secures to him the unalienable 
right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of hap- 
piness. It is impossible for the most ultra advo- 
cate of " human rights " to paraphrase these 
words, or give them a rendering so as to make 
them support his dogmas more strongly than 
they now do. On the contrary, he would only 
weaken their force by the attempt. 

Now, my dear brother, I would candidly, se- 
riously ask you — I would ask all your southern 
friends — I would ask everybody, Can the sen- 
timent of that Declaration be consistent vith 
American slavery ? Are not slaves men ? Do 
color and degradation change a creature of God 
from a human being to a soulless brute ? No ; 
our southern brethren would as indignantly re- 
pudiate this infidel view as we at the INorth. 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 59 

Now if a slave is a man, he has received from 
his Creator an unalienable right to liberty if 
he chooses to avail himself of it, or else the first 
principle laid down in our revered Declaration 
of Independence, so far from being " self evident," 
is in fact untrue, and ought at once to be taken 
from its honored position in the archives of these 
United States, and consigned to the heaps of 
rubbish of the dark ages. 

But does the slave enjoy this liberty? or is 
it within his reach? It will not be pretended. 
The very name by which his class is designated 
forbids it. The term free slave is a solecism. 
His liberty consists in the freedom to do as he 
is told to do, or suffer punishment for his dis- 
obedience, and he can pursue happiness only in 
accordance with the will of his master. 

There is the same incongruity between slavery 
and that clause in our constitution which stip- 
ulates that " no person shall be deprived of life, 
liberty, or property, without due process of law." 
Now, my brother, does it not require considerable 
ingenuity and special pleading to avoid con- 
clusions to which unbiased common sense 
would arrive in an instant, in the application of 
these declared rights to persons held as slaves ? 
I am not going to inflict upon you a disserta- 
tion, or a series of syllogisms on this hackneyed 



60 FRIENDLY LETTERS, ETC. 

subject, but I beg that you and your Mends will 
calmly look again at what, I doubt not, you have 
seen before, — the palpable incongruity between 
the system of holding persons perpetually in 
slavery without their consent, and those de- 
clared, self-evident, heaven bestowed, unalienable 
rights professedly secured to all men in these 
United States by our glorious constitution. 
Said that great statesman and patriot, Henry 
Clay: "We present to the world the sorry spec- 
tacle of a nation that worships Slavery as a 
household goddess, after having constituted Lib- 
erty the presiding divinity over church and 
state." 

Surely something must be out of joint here. 
I have looked again and again at this matter, I 
think with perfect candor, and I have tried to the 
utmost of my ability to reconcile these apparent 
inconsistencies, but I cannot do it. Can you ? 

Believe me, as ever, your sincere friend and 
Christian Brother. 



LETTER IV. 

Slavery transforms men to chattels. — southern laws. — 
slave-auctions. — men placed on a level with brutes. — 
no redress for wrongs. — ignorance perpetuated by 

LAW. 

My dear Christian Friend, — A second 
characteristic of American slavery is, It regards 
human beings, declared to be in the " image of 
God," as " chattels," — things or articles of mer- 
chandise. " Slaves," say the laws of South 
Carolina and Georgia, " shall be deemed, sold, 
taken, reputed, and adjudged in law to be 
chattels personal in the hands of their owners 
and possessors, and their executors, administra- 
tors and assigns, to all intents, constructions, 
and purposes whatsoever." * "A slave," says 
the code of Louisiana, "is one who is in the 
power of his master, to whom he belongs. The 
master may sell him, dispose of his person, his 

* See 2 Brevard's Digest, 229 ; Prince's Digest, 446. 

(61) 



62 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

industry, and his labor; he can do nothing, 
possess nothing, nor acquire any thing, but what 
must belong to his master." * 

Thus, rational, immortal beings, children of 
our common Father in heaven, are taken from 
the exalted scale in which God placed them, and 
degraded to that of the brute creation. They 
are, as you know, advertised, mortgaged, at- 
tached, inherited, leased, bought, and sold like 
horses and cattle. Like them they are brought 
to the auction block, and like them subjected to 
a rigid examination as to their age, and sound- 
ness of wind, chest, and limb. Said a gentle- 
man to me : " When I was at , I visited the 

slave mart ; and as I saw one and another and 
another of my fellow-beings brought forward to 
the block, and rudely exposed and minutely 
examined, in order to ascertain their marketable 
value in dollars and cents, and then struck off to 
the highest bidder, amid the gibes and jeers of 
the vulgar, my heart was nigh unto bursting, 
and I was obliged to turn away my eyes and 
weep, exclaiming, O God ! can it be ! thy chil- 
dren ! my brothers and sisters of humanity, — 
perhaps my fellow-heirs of heaven, — precious 
souls for whom the Saviour died, whose names 

* Civil Code, Art. 35. 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 63 

may be written in the Book of Life, and over 
whose repentance angels may have rejoiced! 
Can it be ? " 

For myself, I never witnessed any such scenes, 
and heaven grant I never may. It is enough, 
and too much for me to know, that they exist. 
I allude to them in this connection, not to 
awaken and pain your sensibilities, but simply 
to illustrate the fact, that American slavery 
sanctions them, and by its operation brings down 
the noblest work of God to a level of the beasts 
that perish. As far as it can do so, it dehuman- 
izes man, and treats him as a thing without a 
soul. It may be remarked, however, in passing, 
" A man's a man, for a' that." 

I might speak in this connection of the obsta- 
cles which are thrown in the way of the slave's 
obtaining redress for his wrongs should he un- 
fortunately get into the hands of a cruel and 
unreasonable master, being forbidden to defend 
himself, and not allowed the testimony of his 
brethren to be given in his behalf; but there are 
other features of this system which more ur- 
gently demand our attention. 

Neither will I dwell upon the ignorance and 
mental degradation which are an essential part 
of the system. You need not be informed, that, 
in ten States, knowledge is kept from the slave 



64 FEIEXDLY LETTERS, ETC. 

by legal enactments, — that teaching him to read 
is regarded a crime, to be severely " punished by 
the judges." I was happy to find that you and 
a great many others totally disregard that law, 
and, in spite of legislators and penal statutes, 
you teach your slaves to read, and in some 
cases to write. For this crime, I dcubt not but 
heaven, at least, will forgive you. I shall allude 
to this latter topic again in a future letter. 

Most truly and affectionately, yours, etc. 



LETTER V 



Domestic life. — the marriage relation. — domestic hap- 
piness A RELIC OF PARADISE. — ITS ENDEARMENTS. — ITS 
VALUE. — THE BARBARISM OF INVADING THE DOMESTIC SANC- 
TUARY. — AN ILLUSTRATION. 

My dear Brother, — I come now, in the third 
place, to speak of slavery as it is related to the 
endearments and duties of domestic life. On 
this subject my heart is full. I am almost 
afraid to speak, lest I say what I ought not; 
and yet I cannot keep silence. I can, in a good 
measure, sympathize with Elihu when he said, — 

" For I am full of words, 
The spirit within me doth constrain me, 
Behold I am as wine which hath no vent, 
I am ready to burst like new bottles, 
I will speak that I may breathe more freely, 
I will open my lips and reply." * 

We now approach a topic more intimately 

* Job eh. 32, v. 17-20, Barnes's translation. 

5 < 65 > 



66 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

connected with the present and future happiness 
of the human race than almost any other. Man 
was not completely blest, even in Eden, until 
God instituted the marriage relation. His Cre- 
ator gave him a companion to participate in his 
joys, binding them together by ties which no 
human power might sunder. Paradise was lost 
by sin, but as our first parents were exiled thence, 
God in infinite kindness permitted them to take 
one of its purest, sweetest sources of joy with 
them to this world of sorrows. 

" Domestic happiness ! thou only bliss 
Of Paradise that has survived the fall ! " 

You, my dear brother, are a husband and a 
father, and can appreciate my meaning, when I 
speak of the richness, the tenderness, the depth, 
of connubial and paternal love ; how it lights up 
this dark world with smiles, — how it stimulates 
us to manly exertion, — how it lightens the bur- 
dens of human life, and enables us cheerfully to 
sustain its ills, while it almost restores to us 
Eden itself. To understand what is meant by 
the term domestic happiness, it is necessary for 
you and me only to look at the circles around 
our own firesides, and listen to the musical ac- 
cents of the loved ones who dwell there, as they 
pronounce the words husband, father, mother, 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 67 

brother, sister, and exchange with them kind 
looks and the affectionate embrace. "What 
earthly joys can be compared with those of 
home? W 7 hat would tempt ns to pari with 
them ? All the gold in California and Australia 
would be spurned in contempt, if offered in ex- 
change. What should we say, and what should 
we do, were any power on earth to interfere with 
our fireside delights, and attempt to wrest them 
from us ? 

Suppose Providence had cast our lot under a 
despotic government, which we will suppose to 
be for the most part kind and paternal, but hav- 
ing this peculiarity, — every now and then, find- 
ing its finances embarrassed, it should be in the 
habit of selling some of its subjects to a foreign 
power to strengthen its exchequer, and should 
arbitrarily select its victims from this family and 
that; — how should you feel were the doomed 
family your own ? What would have been your 
emotions this morning, had some one come to 
your room and told you that that bright-eyed 
boy, " Willie," who last night sat upon youi 
knee and amused you with his innocent prattle, 
showed you his toys, examined your pockets, 
played with your hair and features, and finally 
clasped his little arms around your neck and im- 
pressed the " good-night " kiss upon your lips, 



68 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

had been seized by an officer, and sold from your 
sight forever to you know not whom, and to be 
carried you know not whither ? Nay, more ; — 
suppose that while he was yet speaking, there 
came also another with the tidings that the same 
fate had befallen your first-born,— your daughter, 
just budding into womanhood, — the affection- 
ate, joyous, light-hearted " Kate," whose voice to 
your ear is sweeter than the music of flowing 
waters, whose feet are swifter than those of the 
light gazelle, as with open arms she bounds to 
meet you on your return from a temporary ab- 
sence, to welcome you home with a tear of joy in 
her eye and a kiss upon her lips, — that she too 
had been by the officials of the government clan- 
destinely abducted from your dwelling, and sold, 
literally sold, for a valuation put upon her person 
in dollars and cents, to a hopeless captivity, to 
spend her days in unrequited toil, or, not unlikely, 
in ministering to the caprices and brutal passions 
of a stranger ? 

And while he was yet speaking, and as your 
wife, half frantic with grief and terror, was en- 
twining her arms around you, and you were 
striving to ease your bursting heart, to crown 
the whole, suppose another official and his posse 
had entered your apartment, and by force of 
arms had torn her from your embrace, and with 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 69 

thongs upon her hands, and a bandage over her 
mouth, hurried her away to greet your sight no 
more ? What a scene ! There go in one direc- 
tion the children of your body, " bone of your 
bone, and flesh of your flesh," to an unknown 
but fearful destiny! In another is ruthlessly 
borne the object dearer to you than all the world 
beside, — one whom you had solemnly sworn to 
love, cherish, and protect until death, — the light 
of your dwelling, — the mother of your children, 
— the mutual sharer of all your joys and sor- 
rows, — the richest and most precious treasure 
heaven ever gave you! — there she goes in an 
agony of wo, to toil under a burning sun, com- 
pelled to call another man her husband, or, it 
may be, to grace her master's seraglio ! Merciful 
God ! what meaneth this ? What horde of bar- 
barians from the dark corners of the earth have 
found their way hither to lay waste all that is 
beautiful and lovely ! What fiend from the pit 
has been let loose to enter this little Paradise to 
destroy and bear away all the good that was left 
of the primitive Eden ! 

No ruthless band of barbarians from benighted 
lands have found their way to this Christian do- 
mestic sanctuary, — no malignant spirit from be- 
low has been here to snatch the only type of 
Heaven that escaped his grasp six thousand 



70 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

years ago. " Think it not strange," brother, "con- 
cerning this fiery trial as though some strange 
thing had happened to you." This is only the 
legitimate working of the patriarchal system of 
government under which we five. Be calm, — 
this is all done according to law, and with as 
much kindness as the circumstances will permit. 
No stripes are inflicted, and no more force is ex- 
erted than is absolutely necessary to secure the 
object, and prevent a useless outcry ; no ill-will 
is entertained toward the victims of these out- 
rages, — it is only because the finances of the gov- 
ernment are low, and must be replenished, and 
this is the most convenient, and perhaps at pres- 
ent the only practical, way of raising the money ! 
Now, my brother, what should you and I think 
of living under a government where such things 
were permitted by the laws ? It would not rec- 
oncile us to the administration to be told, that 
such proceedings as I have supposed are of rare 
occurrence, and that the general character of the 
government is kind, that it dislikes exceedingly to 
sell its subjects, and especially that it has a great 
repugnance to separating husbands and wives, 
and breaking up of families, and does it only when 
severely pressed by pecuniary necessity. To 
your and my mind this would be altogether un- 
satisfactory ; it would not change our opinion of 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 71 

the system. No matter if the heart-rending ?cene 
I have supposed were witnessed only once a year, 
or once in ten years, — I think we should loudly 
protest against a system which allowed the oc- 
currence of it at all. 

You will please, my dear sir, apply the fore- 
going illustration to the liabilities and actual 
workings of the slave system at the South, just 
so far as it is applicable, and no further. If there 
are any points in which the analogy fails, I will 
thank you to point them out to me in your next. 
With much love and esteem, 

I remain yours, most truly. 



LETTER VI. 

SACREDNESS OF THE MARRIAGE RELATION. — GOD ALONE CAN 
DISSOLVE IT. — THE " HIGHER LAW." — SLAVERY SA:N"CTIO>"S 
POLYGAMY AND ADULTERY. — RELATION OF PARENTS TO THEIR 
CHILDREN. — FEARFUL RESPONSIBILITY ASSUMED. 

My dear Christian Brother, — My objec- 
tions to any system of government that inter- 
feres at will with the family relation, and forcibly 
separates husbands and wives, parents and chil- 
dren, do not arise chiefly from the personal 
wrongs and bitter woes inflicted upon its vic- 
tims. A contemplation of these is calculated to 
affect our sensibilities, and excite the tender sym- 
pathies of our nature ; but there is a more en- 
larged Christian view which forces itself upon 
us. If we could by some magic process allay 
the anguish of the stricken heart, and heal its 
•wounds when the strongest ties of nature are 
rent asunder, — could we even obliterate the sus- 
ceptibilities of the soul, destroy natural affection, 
and render man more callous than the brutes, so 

(72) 



FRIENDLY LETTERS, ETC. 73 

that he could be torn from his home and kindred 
with less pain than they, — in a moral point of 
view the case would be altered but little. As I 
have remarked in a previous letter, the marriage 
relation was instituted by God, and he made it 
indissoluble. " What God hath joined together 
let not man put asunder," is the language of 
" holy writ ; " and whoever, for any cause which 
God himself has not specified, breaks up this re- 
lation, encroaches upon God's prerogative, and 
goes directly in face of his positive commands. 
Much has been said of late, seriously, sarcasti- 
cally, and contemptuously, about a " higher 
law ; " but notwithstanding the improper use 
often made of that term, there is an important 
sense in which you, and I, and every Christian 
recognize what that term implies. If, on any sub- 
ject whatever, human enactments do obviously 
conflict with the enactments of God, then God's 
law is the "higher" and must be obeyed. To 
deny this is worse than infidelity. 

Now, brother, does not the system of slavery 
in the United States tolerate, and even author- 
ize, the forcible rending asunder of the marriage 
tie? Are not husbands, not seldom, but often, 
sold from their wives, and wives from their 
husbands, and new matrimonial alliances formed 
by them, with consent and encouragement of 



74 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

their masters? Thus is flagrant adultery sanc- 
tioned in nearly one half of the States of this 
Christian Republic, and in some cases the crime 
is almost, if not quite, forced upon the wretched 
perpetrators of it. When God's law is disre- 
garded, and an ordinance on which depends all 
we hold dear in social and Christian life is 
trampled in the dust by an institution existing in 
the midst of us, what shall we say ? If slavery 
were a question merely of expediency, political 
economy, or even personal wrong and suffering, 
it would be easier to keep silence; but when 
God is dishonored, and gross sin sanctioned by 
law, is it not the duty of his children, North and 
South, to enter their solemn, earnest, decided 
protestations ? You will agree with me, that 
no Christian can or ought to acquiesce in what, 
either directly or indirectly, violates a positive 
divine precept; and against what shall he re- 
monstrate, if not against a system that encour- 
ages polygamy and legalizes adultery ? * 

* It is sometimes said that the crime of adultery is neither 
perpetrated nor encouraged by the breaking up of slave- 
families, because, generally, the connections formed are not 
truly marriage, not being solemnized according to forms of 
law, and hence the marriage obligation cannot be violated. 

It may be replied, if this be so, it presents slavery in a 
worse light still, for it encourages and perpetuates a state of 
universal concubinage. But it is not so. When a slave 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 75 

There is another view in which the operation 
of the system of slavery, in breaking up families, 
has affected my mind powerfully and painfully. 
Parents sustain most important relations to their 
children, as well as to each other. Who can be 
so much interested in the temporal and eternal 
well-being of the child as those by whose instru- 
mentality he had his existence ? Who has so 
much influence over him, or who could direct his 
feet in the way he should go, so well ? God has 
imposed upon all parents most important duties, 
which they may not neglect. These duties are 
as truly incumbent on the slave-parent as on the 
master who sustains the same relation. It may 
be, indeed, extensively true that he does not 
understand them, and is in a great measure in- 
competent to discharge them ; and that often the 
child suffers nothing morally or intellectually by 
being removed from his influence. But this 
results in a great measure from the hopeless 
ignorance in which the parent is involved. 
There are, however, as you can bear witness, 

takes a companion, and they consent and engage to live 
together as husband and wife until death, and they thus 
declare their intentions before others, whether any legal 
form is gone through or not, they are as truly " no more 
twain but one flesh" as were Adam and Eve. It has been 
thus decided by our courts in regard to white persons. 



76 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

multitudes of exceptions. In how many cases 
are slave-parents truly pious and intelligent, and 
feel as much solicitude for the eternal interests 
of their children, as you do for yours, and pray 
with them as frequently and as fervently. With 
how much pleasure did you and I listen to your 
" Jamie," one time when we were taking an 
evening stroll past his cabin, and overheard his 
family prayer. With what simplicity and ear- 
nestness did he pour out his soul to God for the 
salvation of his " dear children." And do you 
not remember, too, how with equal importunity 
he prayed God to " bless dear kind Massa and 
Missus, and dere precious children, and also 
Massa's friend, and dat all may meet to praise 
Jesus togedder in heaven," and how we found it 
difficult to speak for a minute or two, and how 
the big tear-drops stood in our eyes, and we 
could n't help it ? 

You told me there were a great many 
" Jamies " at the South, and I have no doubt of 
it ; they love their little ones as well, and who so 
competent to train them up for Christ? Who 
will presume to step in between these parents 
and their children and say, this family altar shall 
be broken down, and those who have bowed 
around it shall be separated, to meet no more till 
they meet at the judgment ? Who will peril his 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. // 

own soul by taking those children away from 
such an influence, and for a pecuniary considera- 
tion cast them upon the wide world with none to 
instruct them, and none to care or pray for them, 
except their heart-broken parents whom they 
have left behind ? I would not do it, neither 
would you, for the wealth of the world ; and yet, 
is it not often done ? In speaking of this sub- 
ject, one of the most eminent southern divines * 
uses the following language : " Slavery, as it 
exists among us, sets up between parents and 
their children an authority higher than the im- 
pulse of nature and the laws of God ; breaks up 
the authority of the father over his own offspring, 
and at pleasure separates the mother at a return- 
less distance from her child, thus outraging all 
decency and justice." I shall refer to the sen- 
timents of this brother again. 
I remain as ever, 

Affectionately yours, etc. 

* Rev. R. I. Breckenridge, D. D. 



LETTER VII. 

The crowning evil of slavery. — preciousness of the 
bible. — our chart and compass on life's voyage in- 
dispensable. — oral instructions insufficient. — dangers. 
— shipwreck almost inevitable. — withheld from the 
slave. — shuts multitudes out of heaven. — american 
bible society. — testimony of general assembly. — of 
synod of kentucky. — of dr. breckenridge. 

My dear Brother, — There is one feature of 
slavery, fourthly, which gives me more pain 
by far than any other, and I may say more than 
all others put together, and that is, it imperils the 
immortal souls of millions of our fellow-beings 
by keeping from them the Word of God. 

Next to the Saviour, and the Holy Spirit, the 
most precious gift God has bestowed on man is 
the Bible. This volume contains our only per- 
fect rule of life, and is our only guide to heaven. 
It teaches us our character and our destiny ; it 
alone raises the curtain between time and eter- 
nity, and dissipates the darkness that otherwise 
would forever enshroud the grave ; it reveals to 

(78) 



FRIENDLY LETTERS, ETC. 79 

us another state of being, in which we shall be 
happy or miserable, agea without end. On this 
Book alone do we depend for our knowledge of 
the way of salvation by Christ. It is here we 
read the story of the manger and the cross, and 
the wonderful plan of redemption through aton- 
ing blood. What could we do without the 
Bible ? It is of infinitely greater value than 
houses and lands, silver and gold, and every 
earthly good beside. To take from us the Bible, 
would be like blotting out the sun in the heavens, 
and enveloping the universe in the gloom and 
darkness of eternal night. Take from me riches, 
honors, pleasures, comforts, and even liberty 
itself; and give me instead thereof poverty, 
disgrace, pains, affliction, hunger, cold, naked- 
ness, and a dungeon ; tear me from my friends, 
bind me with chains, scourge me with the lash, 
brand my flesh with hot irons, deprive me of 
every source of earthly good, and inflict upon me 
every kind of bodily and mental anguish which 
the utmost refinement of cruelty can invent ; — 
but give me my Bible — leave me this precious 
treasure, which is the gift of my heavenly Father, 
to teach me his will and guide me to himself. 
Torture and destroy my body, if you will, but 
O ! give me facilities for saving my soul. Turn 
me not adrift on life's troubled ocean to seek 



80 FEIEXDLY LETTEES 

alone a far distant shore, exposed continually to 
storms, breakers, hidden reefs, whirlpools, and 
shoals, with nothing but a few verbal instruc- 
tions to direct my way. If I am to make this 
fearful voyage, (and make it I must,) take not 
from me my chart and compass. Your verbal 
directions I shall be likely to forget when I most 
need them. The polestar, which you tell me 
may be my guide, is often for a long time 
concealed by impenetrable clouds. There are 
fearful maelstroms, near the verge of whose 
deceptive and destructive circles my course lies, 
and ere I am aware of it I shall have passed 
the fatal line, from which no voyager returns. 
Between me and my desired haven there 
is a "hell-gate," where are sunken rocks and 
conflicting currents, and amid all these compli- 
cated dangers my frail bark will make ship- 
wreck, without my chart and compass. De- 
prived of these, I cannot keep my reckoning, I 
cannot shape my course, I cannot find my 
haven. 

I need not tell you, my dear brother, that it is a 
part of the slaveholding policy to take from thou- 
sands and millions of immortal beings in our 
nominally Christian land, this precious chart and 
compass, — the Bible, the only safe guide to 
heaven. I have often heard you speak of it, 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 81 

and deplore it. Those severe laws which forbid 
teaching the slave to read, do virtually take from 
him the Bible, — his directory to the New Jeru- 
salem. You may, indeed, give him oral instruc- 
tion, and in many instances, no doubt, they are 
blessed to his conversion ; but how utterly inade- 
quate are they to his spiritual wants, how imper- 
fect are they at best, and in how many thousands 
of cases are even these entirely wanting. Every 
enlightened and intelligent Christian knows, from 
his own experience, how hard it is to enter the 
" strait gate," and to keep in the " narrow 
way," and how needful to him are all the helps 
within his reach, and then he is but "scarcely 
saved." What hope is there, then, for the poor 
slave, who is deprived, not only of most of the 
ordinary and extraordinary means of grace which 
we enjoy, but is forbidden the printed Word of 
God? Is not a fearful responsibility incurred 
by those who, for any reason, stand between 
God and his children, and intercept those mes- 
sages of grace and mercy which are contained 
in the Holy Scriptures ? 

That noble institution, the American Bible So- 
ciety, is multiplying copies of the sacred Word by 
thousands and hundreds of thousands, and scat- 
tering them over the land and the world ; it hesi- 
tates not to thrust them into the hands of the fol- 
6 



82 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

lowers of the false prophet, — the deluded follow- 
ers of the man of sin, — the disciples of Confu- 
cius and Zoroaster, — the worshippers of Jugger- 
naut and Vishnoo, and the degraded inhabitants 
of the South Seas and Cam-aria ; — it benevo- 
lently resolves to put a copy of the Bible into the 
dwelling of every white family in these United 
States ; but it is obliged by law to pass by the 
cabin of the slave, and leave more than three 
millions of immortal beings to find the road to 
.heaven the best way they can. 

My brother, I cannot think of these things 
without the deepest grief, and I know that you 
fully sympathize with me ; but it is some conso- 
lation to believe that the great mass of evangeli- 
cal Christians take the same views of the wrongs 
inflicted upon the slave that we do, for it is to 
the Christian sentiment of this country that we 
must look for the removal of them. 

Our brethren of the Presbyterian church have 
borne their testimony most fully and pointedly 
against the evils of slavery which we have been 
considering. You doubtless recollect the action 
of the General Assembly on this subject in 1818. 
A committee was appointed, to whom was re- 
ferred certain resolutions on the subject of selling 
a slave, — a member of the church, — and which 
was directed to prepare a report to be adopted 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 83 

by the Assembly, expressing their opinion in 
general on the subject of slavery. The report of 
this committee was unanimously adopted, and 
ordered to be published. It is, in part, as fol- 
lows : — 

" The General Assembly of the Presbyterian 
Church, having taken into consideration the sub- 
ject of slavery, think proper to make known 
their sentiments upon it to the churches. 

" We consider the voluntary enslaving of the 
one part of the human race by another, as a 
gross violation of the most precious and sacred 
rights of human nature ; as utterly inconsistent 
with the law of God, which requires us to love 
our neighbors as ourselves ; and as totally irre- 
concilable with the spirit and principles of the 
gospel of Christ, which enjoins that all things 
* whatsoever ye would that men should do to 
you, do ye^even so to them.' Slavery creates a 
paradox in the moral system ; it exhibits rational, 
accountable, and immortal beings in such cir- 
cumstances as scarcely to leave them the power 
of moral action. It exhibits them as dependent 
on the will of others, whether they shall receive 
religious instruction ; whether they shall know 
and worship the true God ; whether they shall 
enjoy the ordinances of the gospel ; whether they 
shall perform the duties and cherish the endear- 



84 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

merits of husbands and wives, parents and chil- 
dren, neighbors and friends ; whether they shall 
preserve their chastity and purity, or regard the 
dictates of justice and humanity. 

" Such are some of the consequences of slavery, 
— consequences, not imaginary, but which con- 
nect themselves with its very existence. The 
evils to which the slave is always exposed often 
take place in fact, and in their very worst degree 
and form, and where all of them do not take 
place, as we rejoice to say that in many instances, 
through the influence of the principles of human- 
ity and religion on the minds of masters, they 
do not, still the slave is deprived of his natural 
right, degraded as a human being, and exposed 
to the danger of passing into the hands of a mas- 
ter who may inflict upon him all the hardships 
which inhumanity and avarice may suggest." 

An Address from the Synod of Kentucky, in 
1835, to the Presbyterians of that State, is much 
more specific in its delineations of the evils of 
slavery, and in its denunciations of the system, 
and adopts language far more severe than many 
northern Christians would think it expedient to 
use. It presents a picture of its actual workings 
which could be drawn only by one who had seen 
the original. If you have not read this address, 
I beg that you will do so. It is altogether a 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 85 

southern document. I have room only for a short 
extract. 

Slavery is characterized as " a demoralizing 
and cruel system, which it would be an insult to 
God to imagine that he does not abhor ; a system 
which exhibits power without responsibility, toil 
without recompense, life without liberty, Law with- 
out justice, wrongs without redress, infamy with- 
out crime, punishment without guilt, and families 
without marriage ; a system which will not only 
make victims of the present unhappy generation, 
inflicting upon them the degradation, the con- 
tempt, the lassitude, and the anguish of hopeless 
oppression ; but which even aims at transmitting 
this heritage of injury and woe to their children 
and their children's children, down to their latest 
posterity. Can any Christian contemplate, with- 
out trembling, his own agency in the perpetuation 
of such a system ? " 

Coincident with the judgment of these two 
most respectable and revered ecclesiastical bodies 
is the testimony of one of the most prominent 
and honored sons of the southern church, the Rev. 
Dr. R. L Breckenridge. Says he : — 

" What then is slavery ? for the question relates 
to the action of certain principles of it, and to its 
probable and proper results ; what is slavery as it 



86 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

exists among us ? "We reply, it is that condition 
enforced by the laws of one half of the States of 
this confederacy, in which one portion of the com- 
munity, called masters, are allowed such power 
over another portion called slaves, as — 

" 1. To deprive them of the entire earnings of 
their own labor, except so much as is necessary 
to continue labor itself by continuing healthful 
existence : thus committing clear robbery. 

"2. To reduce them to the necessity of uni- 
versal concubinage, by denying to them the civil 
rights of marriage, thus breaking up the dearest 
relations of life,, and encouraging universal pros- 
titution. 

" 3. To deprive them of the means and oppor- 
tunities of moral and intellectual culture, in many 
States making it a high penal offence to teach 
them to read, thus perpetuating whatever of evil 
there is that proceeds from ignorance. 

" 4. To set up between parents and their chil- 
dren an authority higher than the impulse of 
nature and the laws of God, which breaks up the 
authority of the father over his own offspring, 
and at pleasure separates the mother at a return- 
less distance from her child, thus abrogating the 
clearest laws of nature, thus outraging all decency 
and justice, and degrading and oppressing thou- 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 87 

sands upon thousands of beings, created like 
themselves in the image of the most high God ! 
This is slavery as it is daily exhibited in every 
slave State." 

Yes, such is the nature and character of an in- 
stitution in this enlightened Christian republic, 
claiming to be the freest nation on earth, calling 
itself " an asylum for the oppressed," inviting the 
downtrodden subjects of all the despots of the 
old world to come to this happy land, and place 
themselves under the protection of the American 
eagle, and in this " eyrie of the free " taste and 
enjoy the sweets of liberty! 

The views presented in the above extracts may 
be taken, it is to be presumed, as an exponent of 
the southern Christian sentiment on domestic 
slavery. There are, indeed, exceptions. It is 
painful to notice that within a few years some 
men of reputed piety and worth have been at- 
tempting to maintain that American slavery is a 
" divine and patriarchal institution," " sanctioned 
by the Bible," — is "necessary to the highest 
state of society," and is "to be perpetuated;" 
but I am happy to believe that the number of 
those who hold such views, repudiating those of 
the Presbyterian church, and at the same time 
call themselves disciples of Him who said, " what- 



88 FRIENDLY LETTERS, ETC. 

soever ye would that men should do to you, do 
ye even so to them," is comparatively small. 

I close this long letter by subscribing myself, 
as ever, 

Your affectionate 

Friend and Brother. 



LETTER VIII. 

Three questions suggested. — 1. must slavery be perpet- 
ual,? — 2. DOES THE CHURCH OF CHRIST SUSTAIN ANY RESPON- 
SIBILITY IN THIS MATTER? — 3. WHAT SHALL WE DO? 

My dear Christian Friend, — I fear I shall 
make myself tedious to you by dwelling so long 
upon this, to me, painful subject, — slavery. I will, 
therefore, in the present letter, finish what I have 
to say for the present, hoping that our future cor- 
respondence may be on more grateful themes. 

There are a few questions which are suggested 
to us by the brief view we have taken of this 
most important subject. The first is, Must slavery, 
with all its attendant evils, be perpetuated ? Must 
this blot rest upon our beloved country, and tar- 
nish its escutcheon forever ? I am persuaded 
that the spontaneous answer from the Christian 
heart of this nation is, No ! It was never con- 
templated by Washington nor Jefferson nor 
Adams, nor by the framers of our Constitution, 
nor by the great mass of noble patriots who 

(89) 



90 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

perilled their all for the independence of their 
country, that slavery was to be handed down to 
posterity. If you will look at the writings of the 
leading public men of the last century, you will 
find, that, almost without exception, they looked 
upon slavery in the United States as a temporary 
evil, to be removed as soon as circumstances 
would permit. They regarded it not only a 
wrong inflicted upon the slave, but an incubus 
upon the nation, soon to pass away. 

The great body of Christians in our land have 
been looking forward to the time, and praying for 
its arrival, when all the oppressed within our 
borders shall go free. That the time will come 
when slavery shall cease in our land, I as fully 
believe as I believe that there is a God who pre- 
sides over and directs the destinies of men. 
You and I may not live to see the day ; but it 
will come. 

Another question suggested is, Does the church 
of Christ in this country sustain any responsibil- 
ity in regard to slavery, and has she any duty to 
discharge in relation to it ? By the church of 
Christ, I mean the great mass of Christians of 
every name who love the Lord Jesus in sincerity, 
both North and South. 

This question is easily answered. There are 
no evils existing in the Christian's field of labor — 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 91 

the world — in regard to which he has not some 

responsibility, and for the removal of which he 
is not bound to do something. As a general 
truth, the nearer the evils come to our own fire- 
sides and bosoms, the weightier those responsi- 
bilities become. The hundreds of millions of 
heathens in foreign lands lying in sin and degra- 
dation appeal to our sympathy and efforts, and 
that appeal we may not disregard Bat the 
heathen in our own land have on us much 
stronger claims, and our obligations to put forth 
efforts in their behalf are more imperious. 

Slavery is a great evil and sin, which affects 
not only individuals, but our country ; and, both 
as Christians and patriots, we ought to be sensi- 
bly alive to every thing that affects our common 
weal. You who live at the South, it may be, have 
more responsibility in this matter than we at the 
North ; but none of us can say, " because I am 
not personally implicated in inflicting wrongs 
upon the slave, therefore I have nothing to do for 
their removal." Should this become the universal 
sentiment of the church, Satan's kingdom in our 
world would never come to an end, and wicked 
ness would prevail forever. The spirit of Christi- 
anity, although preeminently mild, gentle, patient, 
and long-suffering, is nevertheless, in an important 



92 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

sense, aggressive. It has ever claimed the right 
of interesting itself in the welfare of every human 
creature — to exert its influence to check the 
progress of sin in every form — to attack error in 
principle and in practice — to " loose the bands 
of wickedness," — " undo heavy burdens," — 
" break every yoke," — " deliver the poor and 
needy," — and to " remember them that are in 
bonds as bound with them." This, by some, may 
be called officiousness, but we cannot help it ; it 
is a part of the Christian's legitimate business to 
volunteer his influence and his services (in every 
proper way) in opposing wrong, and to stand up 
and plead the cause of those who suffer it the 
world over. He cannot refrain from doing so, 
without proving himself false to his Master and 
his Master's cause. 

Admitting, then, that all Christians have 
some kind of responsibility and duty devolv- 
ing on them, a most important question 
comes up. Thirdly, what shall they do? 
There are certainly some things which it is 
perfectly evident we should not do, — though 
we should rebuke this and every sin, we 
should not give vent to our hatred of the 
system in ebullitions of wrath, invective, and 
abuse toward slaveholders. Thus did not 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 93 

Christ nor his apostles. This is not in accor- 
dance with the Christian spirit, and could be 
productive only of evil. 

Neither should we endeavor to exert an influ- 
ence over the slaves to make them restive and 
disobedient ; none but an enemy to the true in- 
terests, both of the slave and his country, would 
do that, unless under some hallucination. 

Neither should we interfere politically with sla- 
very beyond the boundaries of our own State, in 
States where it now exists by the laws of the land. 
I might go on indefinitely, and specify what we 
should not do ; but this does not meet the case ; 
— what shall we do ? It would be arrogance in 
me to attempt a full answer to a question that 
has engaged the attention of many abler heads 
and better hearts than mine, but there are some 
things which have already been said by others, 
that cannot be too frequently repeated. 

In the first place, we can commit this whole 
matter to God in humble, earnest prayer. Here 
is something which we can all do, North and 
South, and in which we shall all be agreed. 
However much we may differ in regard to the 
safety and expediency of other measures to 
moderate the condition of the slave and bring 
about his ultimate emancipation, we are of one 
mind in regard to the safety and efficacy of 



94 FRIENDLY LETTERS 

prayer. One effect of this will be to unite our 
own hearts more closely in sympathy and love. 
There will be no danger of calling each other 
hard names, bandying unchristian epithets, and 
biting and devouring one another, if we are in the 
habit of meeting daily at the throne of grace to 
pray for a cause in which we take a mutual 
interest. 

By prayer we may hope to be enlightened 
more fully in regard to our duty. " If any man 
lack wisdom," and surely we all do on this 
subject, " let him ask of God." 

In answer to prayer, we have reason to hope 
that God will open the eyes to teach the hearts 
of all slaveholders, and lead them to " do justly 
and love mercy," and also that he will, in his 
holy and wise Providence, redress the wrongs of 
his oppressed children, and prepare the way for 
their ultimate emancipation. 

Prayer is the Christian's first and last resort. 
Let us, then, my dear brother, pray over this sub- 
ject continuously, and with an earnestness com- 
mensurate with its importance, and then, I doubt 
not, we shall ourselves be more enlightened than 
we now are as to our future course. 

A second duty, hardly less obvious than prayer, 
is to use all the influence we possess to prevent 
the extension of the domain of slavery. To this 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 95 

end, we should utter our voices long and loud in 
remonstrance against any such measure. If we 
and our legislators may not politically interfere 
with slavery in States where it now exists, we 
may interfere to prevent it from exerting its bale- 
ful influence over territory now free. We should 
do many things for the sake of peace and con- 
ciliation. We have heretofore made concessions 
and compromises — perhaps too many — on 
this subject; but here is where the people of 
God, North and South, should make a stand, 
and declare before heaven and earth, and with 
an emphasis which cannot be misunderstood, that 
not another inch of our public domain shell be 
cursed with slavery for any consideration what- 
ever, if our influence can prevent it. In our re- 
monstrances, we will be respectful, but firm. 
Let our politicians know that all persons who 
are governed by Christian principle, through the 
length and breadth of the land, have taken their 
position, and that the mountains shall be re- 
moved out of their places, ere they will swerve 
from it, and there will be but little danger of 
slave extension. 

In the third place, we should use every en- 
deavor to disseminate the gospel of Christ, and 
bring its principles to bear upon all classes of 
persons, North and South. If we can do this 



96 FRIEXDLY LETTERS 

effectually, it is all sufficient. The Gospel, if 
faithfully applied, is a sure remedy for every 
social and moral evil that ever existed. We at 
the North should demonstrate to our slave- 
holding friends whom we wish to influence, that 
we ourselves are governed by its spirit, and 
actuated by its principle, in all that we do in 
relation to this subject. It is not ambition, a 
lust for power, sectional jealousy, a spirit of 
censoriousness or ill-will, that prompts us to 
what they have been in the habit of regarding as 
intermeddling with their affairs, in which we 
have no concern, but a spirit of love, — love not 
less to them than to their slaves. And then, in 
the temper of Christ, we will bring the Gospel to 
bear on the slaveholder's conscience and sense of 
justice. We will hold up and keep before his 
mind the great rule of life given by Him who 
spake as never man spake, — " Whatsoever ye 
would that men should do to you, do you even so 
to them." Let this rule be once adopted and 
carried out, and it is enough. Human beings 
would no more be sold as beasts in the market, 
and driven to unrequited toil ; the minds of men 
would no longer be kept in ignorance ; the do- 
mestic circle would never again be invaded by the 
hand of sordid avarice separating husbands and 
wives, parents and children, doing savage violence 



TO A CHRISTIAN SLAVEHOLDER. 97 

to the noblest affections of our nature ; the Bible 
would be put into the hands of every slave, and 
he would be taught to read it ; common schools 
and Sabbath schools would be everywhere es- 
tablished and maintained, as well for the slave 
as for the white child ; the master would regard 
those whom he now holds as property as his 
own brethren, going with him to the same judg- 
ment, and destined finally to dwell with him as 
his equals, in the same heaven, and to wear as 
bright crowns and sing as rapturous a song as 
he. He would immediately set himself about 
preparing his slaves for emancipation, and for 
the enjoyment of those natural rights, of which 
they have for so long a time been most unjustly 
deprived. In short, slavery, as the term is now 
understood, would cease instantly, and a kind, 
parental guardianship would take its place, and 
every southern plantation would be transformed 
into a moral garden of beauty and happiness, 
and universal and entire emancipation would fol- 
low with the least possible delay. And, finally, 
we should if possible bring the Gospel to bear 
upon the great body politic, upon our presidents, 
our governors, our National and State legisla- 
tors. It would seem that some of our law- 
makers are much better acquainted with Black- 
stone and Vatte], than they are with the Lord 
7 



98 FRIENDLY LETTERS, ETC. 

Jesus Christ, or they would not disgrace our 
statute-books with laws which ignore the " higher 
laws " of God. We should often remind them 
that this is a Christian, and not a heathen or 
infidel republic ; and that every enactment, not 
consistent with the gospel of Christ and inalien- 
able human rights, does violence to the Christian 
sentiment and Christian conscience of the nation, 
and must be repealed. If they will not hear us, 
we have only to appoint more faithful servants, 
who will do as they are told. We have no idea 
of " uniting church and state," but to infuse as 
much of the Gospel into the state as possible is 
both a privilege and duty ; and when all our 
affairs and institutions, public, domestic, and 
private, are administered on gospel principles, 
we shall become a free, prosperous, and happy 
people, and not till then. 

And now, may God bless you, my dear brother, 
and guide you, and guide us all, to pursue such 
a course in regard to the three and a half mil- 
lions of slaves in our professedly free republic as 
will afford us the most satisfaction when we 
meet them as our equals at the judgment-seat 
of Christ. 

With high esteem and much affection, 

I remain your Christian brother, 

A. C. Baldwin. 



AN ESSAY, 



J 



REV. TBIOTHY WILLISTON. 



IS AMERICAN SLAVERY AX INSTITUTION WHICH CHRISTIANITY 

SANCTIONS, AND WILL PERPETUATE? AND, IN YIEW 

OF THIS SUBJECT, WHAT OUGHT AMERICAN 

CHRISTIANS TO DO, AND REFRAIN 

FROM DOING ? 



Homo sum ; humani nihil a me alienum puto. — Terence. 
Bear ye one another's burdens. — Paul. 

(99) 



ESSAY. 



A great moral question is, in this nineteenth 
century, being tried before the church of Christ, 
and at the bar of public sentiment. It is, Whether 
the system of servitude known as American sla- 
very be a system whose perpetuity is compati* 
ble with pure Christianity ? Whether, with the 
Bible in her hand, the church may lawfully in- 
dorse, participate in, and help perpetuate, this sys- 
tem ? Or whether, on the other hand, the system 
be, in its origin, nature, and workings, intrinsi- 
cally evil ; a thing which, if, like concubinage 
and polygamy, God has indeed tolerated in his 
church, he never approved of ; and which, in the 
progress of a pure Christianity, must inevitably 
become extinct ? I feel assured that the latter 
of these propositions will, without argument, 
command the assent of the mass of living 

(101) 



102 ESSAY. 

Christians. But there are those in the church 
who array themselves on the other side. While 
they would not justify the least inhumanity in 
the treatment of slaves, they profess to believe 
that slavery itself has the approbation of Jeho- 
vah, and may with propriety be perpetuated in 
the church and the world. At their hands I 
would respectfully solicit a patient hearing, while 
I proceed to assign several reasons for differing 
with them in opinion. 

First. Slavery is a condition of society not 
founded in nature. When God, in his Word, 
demands that children shall be in subordination 
to their parents, and citizens to the constituted 
civil authorities, we need no why and wherefore 
to enable us to see the reasonableness of these 
requirements. We feel that they are no arbi- 
trary enactments, but indispensable to the best 
interests of families and of society, and there- 
fore founded in nature. We are prepared, too, 
from their obvious necessity and utility, to rank 
them among the permanent statutes of the Divine 
Legislator. But can as much be said of slavery ? 
Is there such an obvious fitness and utility in 
one man's being, against his will, owned and 
controlled by another, as to prepare us to say that 
such an ownership is founded in the very con- 
stitution of things ? None will pretend that 



ESSAY. 103 

there is. Not only is slavery not founded in 
nature r but, 

Second. It is condemned by the very instincts 
of our moral constitution. These instincts seem 
to whisper that " all men are born free and 
equal ; " equal, not in intellect, or in the petty 
distinctions of parentage, property, or power; 
but having, as the creatures of one God, an 
equal right to " life, liberty, and the pursuit of 
happiness." Job's moral instincts taught him, 
that the fact of all men's having one and the 
same Creator gave his servants a right to con- 
tend with him, when wronged ; and that, if he 
" despised their cause," he must answer it to his 
God and theirs. That men of all races and 
grades are essentially equal before God; that 
every man has a right to himself, to the fruits of 
his toil, and to the unmolested pursuit of happi- 
ness, in all lawful ways ; and hence, that slavery, 
as existing in these States, is a gigantic system 
of evil and wrong, — are truths which the moral 
sense of men is everywhere proclaiming with 
much emphasis and distinctness. If it be not 
so, what means this note of remonstrance, long 
and loud, that comes to our ears over the Atlan- 
tic wave? "Why else did a Mohammedan 
prince,* (to say nothing of what nearly all Chris- 

* Mehemet Ali. 



104 ESSAY. 

tian governments have done,) put an end to sla- 
very in his dominions before he died ? And how 
else shall we account for that moral earthquake 
which has for years been rocking this great re- 
public to its very centre ? One cannot thought- 
fully observe the signs of the times, — no, nor the 
workings of his own heart, methinks, — without 
perceiving that slavery is at war with the moral 
sense of mankind. If there be any conscience 
that approves, it must be a conscience per- 
verted by wrong instruction, or by a vicious 
practice. And can that be a good institution, 
and worthy of perpetuity, which an unperverted 
conscience instinctively condemns ? 

Third. The bad character of slavery becomes 
yet more apparent, if we consider the manner in 
which it has chiefly originated and been sus- 
tained. Did God institute the relation of master 
and slave, as he did the conjugal and parental 
relations ? It is not pretended. In what, then, 
did slavery have its beginning ? Doubtless the 
first slaves were captives, taken in war. In prim- 
itive ages, the victors in war were considered as 
having a right to do what they pleased with their 
captives; and so it sometimes happened that they 
were put to death, and sometimes that they were 
made to serve their captors as bondmen. Thus 
slavery was at first the incidental result of war. 



ESSAY. 105 

But as time rolled on, the love of power and of 
gain prompted men to make aggressions on their 
weaker neighbors, for the very purpose of enslav- 
ing them ; and, eventually, man-stealing and the 
slave-trade became familiar facts in the world's 
history. Upon these has slavery, for centuries 
past, depended mainly for its continuance. And, 
although these feeders of slavery are now by 
Christian nations branded as piracy and strictly 
vetoed, they are far from being exterminated. 
Indeed, it seems to be well understood, that, if all 
commerce in slaves, foreign and domestic, ceases, 
slavery itself must soon become extinct. 

Now if man-stealing be an act which the Word 
of God and the moral instincts of men do most 
pointedly condemn, — and I will attempt no dem- 
onstration of this here, — what shall we say of 
that which is its legitimate offspring and depend- 
ant ? Far be it from me to affirm, that, circum- 
stanced as our southern brethren are, it is just as 
criminal for them to hold slaves as it would be 
to go now to Africa and forcibly seize them. 
But, in the spirit of love, I would ask my slave- 
holding brother, Can that be a justifiable institu- 
tion, and deserving to be upheld, which has so 
bad a parentage ? " Do men gather grapes of 
thorns ? " " Who can bring a clean thing out of 
an unclean ? " 



106 ESSAY. 

Fourth. There are, in the Scriptures, many 
clear indications that slavery has not the appro- 
bation of God, and hence has not the stamp of 
perpetuity upon it. Under this head, let us notice 
several distinct particulars. 

1. Had God regarded servitude as a good 
thing, he would not, in authoritatively predict- 
ing its existence, have said, " Cursed be Canaan ; 
a servant of servants shall he be unto his breth- 
ren." What God visits men with as a curse 
cannot be intrinsically good and beneficial. 

2. The judgments with which God visited 
Egypt and her proud monarch, for refusing to 
emancipate the Israelites, and for essaying to re- 
capture them, when let go, and the wages which 
he caused his people, when released, to receive 
for their hitherto unrequited toils, clearly evince 
that he has no complacency in compulsory, un- 
rewarded servitude. 

3. The same thing is indicated by the fact 
that God has, by statute, provided expressly for 
the protection and freedom of an escaped slave ; 
but not for the recovery of such a fugitive by his 
master. " Thou shalt not deliver unto his 
master, the servant which is escaped from his 
master unto thee : he shall dwell with thee, 
even among you in that place which he shall 
choose Thou shalt not oppress him." 



ESSAY. 107 

Now be it, if you will, that this statute had refer- 
ence only to servants who should escape into the 
land of Israel from Gentile masters ; does it not 
indicate a strong bias, in the mind of God, to the 
side of freedom, rather than that of slavery ? And 
does it not establish the point, that, in God's esti- 
mation, one man cannot rightfully be deemed 
the property of another man? Were it other- 
wise, would not the Jew have been required to 
restore a runaway to his pursuing master, just as 
he was to restore any other lost thing which its 
owner should come in search of? Or, to say the 
least, would not the Israelites have been allowed 
to reduce to servitude among themselves the 
escaped slave of a heathen master? But how 
unlike all this are the actual requirements of the 
statute. God's people must neither deliver up 
the fugitive nor enslave him themselves ; but 
allow him to dwell among them as a freeman, 
just " where it liketh him best." And, in this 
connection, how significant a fact is it, that the 
Bible nowhere empowers the master from whom 
a slave had escaped to pursue, seize, and drag 
back to bondage that escaped slave. 

4. That which constitutes the grand fountain 
of slavery, — the forcible, stealthy seizure of a 
man, for the purpose of holding or selling him as 
a slave, — was, under the Mosaic dispensation, 



108 ESSAY. 

punishable with death ; and is, in the New Tes- 
tament, named in connection with the most hei- 
nous crimes. " He that stealeth a man, and 
selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall 
surely be put to death." What could more for- 
cibly exhibit God's disapprobation of one of the 
distinctive features of slavery, — compulsion? 
What more impressively show the value that he 
puts upon a man's personal independence, — his 
right to himself? Now if God doomed that man 
to die a felon's death who should steal and sell 
a fellow man, can it be that he would hold him 
guiltless who should buy the stolen man, know- 
ing him to have been stolen ? God's people 
were, indeed, allowed to " buy bondmen and bond- 
maids " of the strangers that dwelt among them, 
and of the surrounding heathen. But were they 
ever allowed to buy persons whom they knew to 
have been unlawfully obtained, and offered for 
sale in manifest opposition to their own wishes ? 
If they were not, — and, from the statute just 
referred to, it seems certain that they were not, — 
does American slavery derive countenance from 
that which was tolerated in the Jewish church 
and nation ? True, the slaves now held as such 
among us were not themselves feloniously seized 
on a foreign soil, torn away from kindred, homes, 
and country, and sold into hopeless bondage in a 



ESSAY. 109 

strange land ; but their sires and grandsires were. 
Man-stealing is confessedly the stock out of which 
has sprung, and grown to its present dimensions, 
the vast and overshadowing Upas of American 
slavery; and if the Bible brands that stock as 
pestiferous, must not the entire tree partake of 
the noxious influence ? Again : if, as competent 
critics assert, the popular sense of the word ren- 
dered " men-stealers," in 1 Tim. i. 10, be " those 
who deal in men — literally, slave-traders," then 
trafficking in slaves for mercenary ends is, by 
Paul, ranked among vices the most abominable ; 
and American slavery is, if possible, more point- 
edly condemned by that passage than by the 
statute found in Ex. xxi. 16. For who does not 
know that trading in " the persons of men " has 
ever been, and yet is, a main pillar in the fabric 
of slavery ? Indeed, man-stealing and slave-trad- 
ing are to slave-holding precisely what the busi- 
ness of the distiller and of the vendor is to the 
vice of intemperance. There is, in either case, 
a trio of associated evils ; and it is difficult to say 
which member of either trio is the most repulsive 
and harmful. 

If, now, it be objected to this argument from 
the Bible, that the Mosaic institutes expressly 
recognize such a thing as involuntary servitude, 
and prescribe rules for its regulation, I answer : 



110 ESSAY. 

true, but the servitude thus recognized and regu- 
lated by statute was of a far milder type than 
that which is legalized in these American States. 
For, 1. It allowed the bondman a large amount 
of leisure, or time which he need not devote to 
his master's service ; 2. It made it possible for 
him to accumulate a considerable amount of 
property ; 3. It placed him on a perfect level with 
his master, in regard to religious privileges; 
4. It gave him his freedom whenever he should 
be so chastised as to result in permanent injury 
to his person : thus operating as a powerful pre- 
ventive of inhumanity in chastising; 5. It re- 
spected the sanctity of the conjugal and parental 
relations, when existing among bondmen, and did 
not authorize a compulsory severing of family 
ties ; 6. It made no provision for the sale of a 
servant by his Jewish master, nor for any such 
domestic commerce in the persons of men as is 
practised in the southern States of this Union ; 
7. It provided for the periodical emancipation of 
all that were in bondage ; thus aiming a fatal 
blow at the very existence of servitude in the 
Hebrew commonwealth. I may not, consistently 
with the necessary brevity of a tract designed 
for popular perusal, go into any demonstration 
of the facts above asserted. For proof that 
they are facts, let my readers studiously examine 



ESSAY. Ill 

the Mosaic books, and the Rev. A. Barnes's " In- 
quiry into the Scriptural Views of Slavery." I 
see not how any candid and discriminating in- 
vestigator can help being convinced that the ser- 
vitude which was temporarily tolerated in the 
Jewish church, was, in numerous respects, very 
unlike to that which exists among us, and far 
less repulsive. 

But suppose, for argument's sake, it had been 
just as repulsive a system as ours, would the fact 
of its having been tolerated under the Jewish 
economy prove it to be intrinsically good, and 
worthy of being perpetuated ? Then, by parity 
of reasoning, the good men of ancient times 
might safely have concluded that certain other 
practices were good and would endure, which 
we know were not good, and were not to last. 
Had the question been propounded in Abraham's 
or in David's day, whether polygamy and concu- 
binage were approved of God, and would be 
perpetuated in the church, it is probable that even 
the saints of those periods would have responded 
affirmatively. The fact that God had so long 
allowed his people to practise these things unre- 
buked, might, to them, have seemed sufficient 
proof that these practices were intrinsically 
proper, and were to rank among the permanent 
fixtures of human society. But were Abraham 



112 ESSAY. 

and David now on the earth, with what changed 
feelings would they regard the cast-off system of 
concubinage and a plurality of wives. Again : 
suppose the conjecture had been hazarded, three 
thousand years ago, that woman, from being a 
menial drudge, or a mere medium of bestial in- 
dulgence, would one day occupy the dignified 
position to which Christianity has actually lifted 
her, would not incredulity have lurked in every 
heart, and found expression on every tongue ? 
Now there are plain indications, not only in the 
Word, but the providences of God, that he never 
regarded slavery with complacency, any more 
than he did polygamy, concubinage, or the serf- 
dom of woman ; and that he never designed its 
perpetuity. Scrutinizing that Word and those 
providences, one needs no prophetic ken to enable 
him to predict with certainty, that, when Christ's 
millennial reign is ushered in, contraband will be 
inscribed on slavery, as it already has been on 
some other evils that were once tolerated, not 
only in society, but in the church of God. 

But I shall be reminded here, that, when the 
apostles were disseminating Christianity in the 
Roman empire, there prevailed thoughout that 
empire a system of slavery more odious and op- 
pressive than ours; and yet that both slave- 
holders and slaves were converted and admitted 



ESSAY. 113 

to the church, without its affecting the relation 
of master and slave ; that the New Testament 
instructs the parties how to demean themselves 
in that relation, but nowhere enjoins emancipa- 
tion on the master, or encourages absconding or 
non-submission in the slave ; in short, that it no- 
where expressly condemns slavery, or intimates 
that its extermination was to be expected or de- 
sired. In reply to this, I would say, — 

(1.) To infer, because the New Testament en- 
joins obedience on slaves, and makes no direct 
attack on the institution of slavery, that it there- 
fore sanctions the institution, and would have it 
perpetuated, is as much a non sequitur as to in- 
fer, because God enjoins on men subjection to 
existing civil authorities, whatever may be their 
character, that he as much approves of a despotic 
as of a constitutional government, — of the govern- 
ment of Ferdinand of Naples as of that of Vic- 
toria of England. Nor is it more difficult to 
comprehend why God has, in the Scriptures, 
made no direct assault on slavery, than it is to 
see why He has not directly assailed govern- 
mental despotisms, or expressed any preference for 
one form of government over another. An ob- 
vious and far-seeing wisdom is discernible in 
this, which it behooves us to admire, and not 
unfrequently to imitate. Had the apostles or 
8 



114 ESS AT. 

the Scriptures openly denounced all absolutism, 
whether civil or domestic, it would have aroused 
unnecessary prejudice and opposition, and 
diverted the attention of men from the grand 
object aimed at in giving the world a written 
and preached gospel. God deemed it wiser to 
reach these evils through the slow but sure pro- 
gress of certain great principles laid down in his 
Word, than through the medium of specific pro- 
hibitions. 

(2.) The fact that the apostles received into 
the church converts who not only held slaves, 
but held them under a slave-system that was 
awfully despotic, was no indorsement on their 
part of that odious system, nor even of the 
slightest inhumanity on the part of a master 
towards his slaves. It does, indeed, prove that a 
man may be a Christian, without ceasing to be 
a slaveholder in form; but not that a master 
may indulge in all the legal barbarities of the 
system, and yet be a Christian. Merely to 
sustain the relation of a Christian master for the 
good of the slave, or from the necessity of the 
case, is one thing, while to advocate and defend 
this chattel system, and hold in bondage fellow 
human beings for personal and selfish ends, is 
quite another thing. Nowhere do the Scriptures 
countenance, or even wink at, the least degree 



ESSAY. 115 

of inhumanity or injustice in the treatment of 
servants. So far from this, they expressly enjoin 
it on masters to " give unto their servants that 
which is just and equal," all the law of disin- 
terested love would require ; accompanying the 
injunction with the significant hint, that they 
themselves have a Master, and that with him 
there is " no respect of persons." 

(3.) Though the Scriptures do not directly 
assail the system of slavery, they indirectly and 
obviously condemn it, and that very abundantly. 
Slavery is indirectly and yet strongly rebuked in 
such passages of Scripture as the following: 
" Wo unto him that useth his neigh- 
bor's service without wages." " Is not this the 
fast that I have chosen, .... to undo the 
heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, 
and that ye break every yoke ? " " What doth the 
Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love 
mercy ?"...." Have we not all one Father ? 
Hath not one God created us ?".... " And 
hath made of one blood all nations of men, for 
to dwell on all the face of the earth ; . . . . that 
they should seek the Lord." . . . . " God is no re- 
specter of persons." " The people of the land 
have used oppression, .... therefore have I 
poured out mine indignation upon them." .... 
" Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." 



116 ESSAY. 

" Therefore, all things whatsoever ye would that 
men should do to you, do ye even so to them." 
It needs no unusual acuteness to see, that, were 
the spirit of these and kindred passages (for nu- 
merous others of the sort might have been cited) 
everywhere acted out, slavery would as readily 
vanish, as do the icebergs of the North, if per- 
chance they float away into milder latitudes. 

Fifth. To the four reasons already assigned for 
thinking that slavery has not God's approbation, 
and ought not to be perpetuated, I will add but 
one more, — its baleful effects. (1). As it re- 
spects worldly thrift, or pecuniary prosperity. It 
is a fact, that slavery exerts a depressing in- 
fluence on the business welfare of any commu- 
nity where it prevails ; and that, other things 
being equal, slaveholding States can never com- 
pete with free ones in the item of financial 
prosperity. A necessary brevity forbids my 
pointing out the causes of this fact ; but my 
readers will, without my aid, readily ascertain 
what they are. Suffice it to say, it has become 
a settled maxim of political economy, that there 
exists an antagonism between slavery and the 
highest business prosperity of any people that 
tolerates it ; and the southern States of this 
Union furnish abundant confirmation of its truth. 
(2.) I will name but one other thing, ■ — its 



ESSAY. 117 

baneful influence on character and morals. 
That slavery tends to debase the character and 
morals of the slaves will scarcely be questioned. 
Apart from the ignorance naturally resulting 
from their condition, that condition powerfully 
tends to render them sensual, indolent, artful, 
mendacious, stealthful, and revengeful. But is 
the bad moral tendency of the institution lim- 
ited to the bondmen? Exerts it no corrupting 
influence on the hearts, the habits, and morals of 
the masters? Is it not its legitimate tendency 
to foster in them such vices as indolence, effem- 
inacy, licentiousness, covetousness, inhumanity, 
haughtiness, and a supreme regard for self ? Of 
course, I do not affirm that it uniformly pro- 
duces these sad effects on the character of mas- 
ters. So far from this, there may doubtless be 
found slaveholders, who, in all that adorns and 
ennobles human character, will compare favor- 
ably with the very best men at the North. I 
think it will be conceded, however, that the 
legitimate tendency is to evil, and that the 
effects of slavery on the character of its sustainers 
are, in the main, disastrous ; and that the depre- 
ciated state of morals prevailing where slavery 
exists is mainly attributable to this as its source. 
I need not here enter into detail. Facts are 
too well known to make this necessary. 



118 ESSAY. 

Thus have we contemplated several distinct 
reasons for believing that slavery is no good 
thing, — has not the sanction of Jehovah, — and 
cannot with propriety be perpetuated. Its con- 
trariety to nature, — its antagonism to the moral 
sense of mankind, — its disgraceful parentage 
and manner of support, — its condemnation by 
the Bible, — and its disastrous influence on 
financial prosperity, on character, and on public 
morals, — all proclaim that slavery, so far from 
being a good thing, is a tremendous curse ; yea, 
more, that it is a stupendous wrong ; and 
hence, that it should be tolerated in the church 
of Christ no longer than the best interests of all 
concerned may render necessary for a safe ter- 
mination. 

But it may be, after all, that I have failed to 
secure the assent of some of my southern breth- 
ren to the justness of the foregoing positions and 
inferences. It may be that they still regard the 
system of bondage prevailing in their midst 
as in the main beneficial, defensible from the 
Bible, and, with some modifications perhaps* 
worthy of perpetuity. Well, brethren, suppose 
you do thus regard it ; and for argument's sake 
suppose, too, that you may possibly be right, — 
that slave-holding may be in itself the harmless 
thing which you deem it ; ought you not cheer- 



ESSAY. 



119 



fully to abandon it, in obedience to a great Bible 
principle, — that of refraining from things which 
are in themselves lawful, or which your con- 
science may not condemn, out of regard to the 
conscience of aggrieved Christian brethren, or to 
the prejudices of those whose salvation you would 
not obstruct? You are aware, brethren, that 
this magnanimous principle Paul both inculcated 
and exemplified. You are also aware that a 
large majority of the Christians now living 
regard your cherished institution as unjustifiable, 
and at variance with the spirit of Christianity ; 
and, so regarding it, they long for its extinction, 
and are grieved with you for cleaving to it so 
tenaciously, and refusing to concert measures 
for its ultimate overthrow. Indeed, they are 
more than grieved ; they are profoundly agitated 
by the fresh developments of the iniquitous 
system which you are helping to uphold; and 
there seems no prospect, while that system en- 
dures, of their becoming tranquillized. A tem- 
pest has sprung up and is raging in the church 
of Christ, — to say nothing of the civilized 
world, — which seems not likely to cease till its 
cause be removed; and slavery is that cause. 
Now I put it to you, brethren, if here be not an 
opportunity of exemplifying, on a broad scale, 
the self-denying and noble principle which Paul 



120 ESSAY. 

indicates in the words, " All things are lawful 
for me, but all things are not expedient ; " " Eat 
not for his sake that shewed it, and for con- 
science' sake : . . . conscience, I say, not thine 
own, but of the other ; " " Though I be free 
from all men, yet have I made myself servant 
unto all, that I might gain the more." Have it, 
if you will, that the brethren for whose sake 
you are asked to make this sacrifice are weak 
brethren, and then consciences weak. Your 
obligation to make it is none the less on that 
account ; for the principle just adverted to con- 
templates cases of this very sort. Since the 
practice which grieves these weak brethren is 
one that you can probably abandon without 
wounding your own conscience, are you at lib- 
erty to undervalue their conscience by persisting 
in that which grieves them ? 

But how much weighter does this argument 
become, when it is remembered that the opposers 
of slavery, besides being exceedingly numerous, 
have, many of them, been eminent, — not merely 
for a conscientious piety, but for talent, for re- 
search, for scholarship, for broad and compre- 
hensive views of things ; — and that the list 
embraces distinguished southern, as well as 
northern men ; and men of celebrity in both 
church and state. There have been found 



ESSAY. 121 

in the anti-slavery ranks, presidents and no- 
ble men, jurists and legislators, statesmen and 
divines, scholars and authors, poets and orators. 
And, still further to enhance the dignity of the 
cause, it should be remembered that several 
General Assemblies of the Presbyterian Church of 
the United States, together with numerous lesser 
ecclesiastical bodies, have lifted up their voice 
in opposition to slavery, and proclaimed substan- 
tially the same views which this humble Essay 
has aimed to exhibit. Now if, as we have seen, 
a deferential regard should be had to the con- 
science of aggrieved Christian brethren, even 
when they are few and feeble-minded, how much 
more, when the aggrieved ones are counted in 
hundreds of thousands? when theirs is an intel- 
ligent piety and an enlightened conscience ? and 
when, too, their remonstrance is backed up by a 
public sentiment that is wellnigh unanimous 
through all Christendom ? 

If now, in spite of all these considerations, I 
still have readers that say in their hearts, slavery 
must be perpetuated, they will pardon me for lin- 
gering no longer in the hope of changing their 
views. I would be indulged, however, in one 
parting interrogation. Has it never occurred to 
you, brethren, that yours is, on some accounts, 
a very unfavorable stand-point from which to 



122 ESSAY. 

form just and disinterested views of slavery ; and 
that your very position as slave-holders, and your 
long familiarity with the system and its evils, 
may have blinded you to the magnitude of those 
evils, and to the great desirableness of their being 
removed ? May it not be that long use, and self- 
interest, and the love of power and ease, have 
conspired to warp your judgment, blunt your 
sensibilities, and cause you to view slavery 
through a deceptive medium ? 

Having, as I hope, the cordial assent of the 
great mass of my readers, northern and southern, 
to the foregoing argument against slavery and its 
perpetuity, we are now prepared to advance to 
the last great division of our subject, and to in- 
quire : What are the duties, positive and nega- 
tive, which this subject imposes on American 
Christians ? What does it demand that we, as 
Christians, should do, and refrain from doing? 
This question subdivides itself thus : What 
ought we northern and professedly anti-slavery 
Christians to do, and not do ? And, next, What 
duties, positive and negative, does the question 
devolve on professing Christians in the slave- 
holding States ? 

I. We are to consider what we, the northern 
and avowedly anti-slavery section of the Ameri- 
can church, ought, in view of this subject, both 



ESSAY. 



123 



to do, and refrain from doing. In reply to the 
question, What ought we to do ? I would say, — 
1. It is not only our right, but duty, temper- 
ately and with Christian courtesy to continue 
to discuss this great theme, both orally and with 
the pen ; and especially to endeavor to bring the 
truth into contact with the mind and heart of our 
southern brethren, — if, peradventure, we may 
thus persuade them soon to cease their connec- 
tion with slavery. Freedom of discussion is one 
important safeguard of the public weal; and 
that must be regarded as a bad, untenable cause 
which will not bear the test of a full and free dis- 
cussion before the world. Free inquiry, too, has 
not only preceded all great reformations, but has 
been an important instrument in bringing them 
about. That great moral change known as the 
temperance reformation is but one example 
among many that might be adduced. If slavery 
is ever to be numbered in history among the 
things that are past, it will be by having Bible 
light and truth made to converge upon it, through 
the lens of free public discussion. Hence, be- 
lieving as we do that American slavery is an 
enormous evil and a gigantic wrong, — a thing 
with which the church should cease to have 
connection as speedily as may be, — as Christians 
we may, we must, employ our tongues and our 



124 ESSAY. 

pens in behalf of the enslaved, till our world 
shall cease to contain such a class of men. 

2. We ought so to exercise the right of suf- 
frage as to resist the extension of slavery beyond 
its present limits. I say nothing here of the 
political question of State rights, or of interfering 
with slavery in States where it now exists. The 
question of authorizing by law the extension of 
slavery into new States and Territories, or of ad- 
mitting new States with pro-slavery constitu- 
tions, is another and very different thing from 
that of disturbing the compact in relation to 
slavery entered into by the founders of this re- 
public. The concessions in relation to the slave 
interest which our fathers made by no means 
oblige us to make further concessions, by consent- 
ing that slavery shall overstep her present geo- 
graphical limits. I know not what others may 
think; but, for one, I feel constrained, by a sense 
of duty to God and my country, so to vote as to 
have my votes tell against the spread of slavery. 
I must carry my Christian principles of love and 
humanity to the ballot-box, as well as elsewhere. 
Though long identified with one of the political 
parties, I have of late felt myself bound, as a 
voter, to ignore the ancient party lines, and even 
to ignore all other questions, compared with the 
one great and absorbing one, Shall slavery be 



ESSAY. 125 

allowed to have more territory, in which to breed 
and expand itself? Jn my deliberate judgment, 
all Christian patriots should, so far as their votes 
can speak, say to the system of bondage existing 
in our midst, " Hitherto shalt thou come, but no 
further, and here shall thy proud waves be 
stayed." This becomes now a moral and a re- 
ligious duty. 

(3.) In our visits to the throne of grace, we 
ought, with more frequency and fervor, "to re- 
member them that are in bonds, as bound with 
them." Assured that all hearts and events are 
at God's disposal, that he abhors oppression, and 
that prayer is the Christian's mode of taking hold 
of God's strength, we must make full proof of 
this as a weapon with which to effect the sub- 
version of slavery. It may be that importunate, 
persevering prayer will effect more in behalf of 
the enslaved than all other instrumentalities. 
It is, at least, quite certain that other means will 
prove inefficacious, if this be not superadded. 

But the question we are considering has a 
negative as well as positive side ; and we will 
next inquire, what we anti-slavery Christians 
ought to refrain from doing. 

1. We must not, in our efforts to subvert sla- 
very, indulge in an unchristian spirit, or in lan- 
guage adapted needlessly to anger and alienate 



126 ESSAY. 

those whom it should be our aim to win. A 
cause that is intrinsically good may be advocated 
in a bad spirit, or with improper weapons ; and 
such may have sometimes been the case with 
ours. Would that all men had ever borne it in 
mind, that truth and love are the only weapons 
with which to wage a successful conflict with 
this or any other deep-seated moral evil. 

2. We must not, in our zeal for emancipation, 
allow mere feeling or benevolent impulses par- 
tially to dethrone reason; and thus disqualify our- 
selves for taking impartial views of the subject, 
or for accurately discriminating between truth 
and error. There may have been men in the 
anti-slavery ranks, with whom sympathy was 
every thing, and reason — and even the Bible — 
comparatively nothing. In obeying the injunc- 
tion to " remember them that are in bonds," 
they may have neglected to remember any thing 
else. Slavery seemed to occupy their entire field 
of vision. Hence, not fully informed in regard 
to the actual condition of things at the South, 
they have erroneously supposed that the slave 
codes prevailing there were the standard by 
which to judge of the actual condition of the 
slaves, and that all the Southern church was 
actually practising the barbarities authorized by 
those codes. As there was no just appreciation 



ESSAY. 127 

of the actual conduct of masters towards their 
servants, so there was no allowance made for the 
circumstances which conspired to render them 
masters, nor for the obstacles which stand in the 
way of their ceasing to be masters. It must be 
admitted, that generally, where unrighteous laws 
are suffered to exist, the mass of the community 
will not be better than tha laws ; but there are 
exceptions, — men who intend to give heed to a 
higher law. So much for allowing an amiable 
but blind sympathy to usurp that throne which 
reason and revelation were designed conjointly 
to occupy. It scarcely need be added, that these 
ultraisms have done much to prejudice the anti- 
slavery cause, and bring it, in the eyes of some, 
into unmerited contempt. We must wipe away 
that reproach, by so conducting our warfare with 
slavery as to evince that we are neither men 
of one idea, nor men whose judgment is led cap- 
tive by their sensibilities. 

3. We must not, in opposing slavery, indorse 
the sentiment, that one cannot in any conceiva- 
ble circumstances give credible evidence of piety, 
and yet continue in form to hold slaves; that 
being a master is, in any and in all circumstan- 
ces, a disciplinable offence in the church ; or that 
it should, without exception, constitute a barrier 



128 ESSAY. 

to church-membership, or to the communion of 
saints at Christ's sacramental board. While we 
believe that all the great principles of God's 
Word go to subvert slavery, and while we are 
constrained to regard the holding of slaves as 
diminishing the evidence of a man's piety, and 
thus far alienating his claims to a good standing 
in the Christian church, we may nevertheless 
make exceptions, and not keep a man out of the 
church, or discipline him when in it, merely be- 
cause he sustains temporarily the relation of mas- 
ter, not for selfish ends, but, as in rare cases, for 
benevolent reasons. But if a man defends the 
system, and takes away from a fellow man ina- 
lienable human rights, then we may and should 
refuse him admission, or subject him to disci- 
pline, as the case may be. But, obvious and im- 
portant as is this distinction, it is one which some 
anti-slavery men may have failed to make ; and 
that failure may have prejudiced or retarded the 
cause of emancipation. A good cause suffers by 
having a single uncandid statement or untenable 
argument advanced in its support ; and the 
friends of the enslaved must afford their oppo- 
nents no room for saying, that their reasonings 
are illogical or anti-scriptural. 

4. We must not, in seeking the extinction of 



ESSAY. 129 

American slavery, so insist on its immediate abo- 
lition as to repudiate the responsibility which a 
master owes to this dependent and depressed 
class of his fellow beings; but that that end 
be kept steadily in view, to be accomplished as 
speedily as is consistent with the best good of 
the parties concerned. The immediate and total 
extinction of southern slavery, if not obviously im- 
possible, is of questionable expediency. The upas 
of American slavery has struck its roots so deep, 
and shot its branches so far, and so interlaced 
itself with all surrounding objects, that, to have 
it instantaneously and unreservedly uprooted, 
might prove, in many cases, disastrous ; and, at 
all events, is not to be expected. To say nothing 
of other obstacles to the immediate abolition of 
Southern slavery, the highest good of many of 
the slaves makes it inexpedient. Some, proba- 
bly many of them, need to pass through an edu- 
cating process, — a kind of mental and moral ap- 
prenticeship, — in order to their profiting largely 
by the boon of emancipation.* 

* The publishers understand the writer to mean, that the 
working of them without wages, — the withholding that 
which is just and equal, — should be immediately and uni- 
versally abandoned, and that emancipation should be granted 
as speedily as the slaves can be prepared to use and 



130 ESSAY. 

II. We are now to inquire, lastly, what du- 
ties, positive and negative, this great question 
devolves on those Christians among whom 
American slavery has its seat, or who are per- 
sonally identified with it. Hoping, brethren, that 
the sentiments thus far advanced are your senti- 
ments, I shall have your further assent when 
I say, 

1. That the extinction, at the earliest consist- 
ent date, of the system of servitude existing 
among you, is a result at which you ought 
steadily and strenuously to aim. And, as you 
see, we base this obligation of yours, not on the 
assumption of any sinfulness which you may 
sustain to slavery, but on the acknowledged in- 
justice and woes, past, present, and prospective, 
of the system as a system, — its contrariety, as a 
system, to the fundamental principles of Chris- 
tianity. Did we regard you as necessarily sinners, 

enjoy their freedom. The right should be acknowledged, 
and the needful means for its security immediately used. 
The writer does not say, that holding men in bondage is not 
generally sinful, nor that all sin should not be immediately 
repented of and forsaken, but only that there may be ex- 
ceptions where for a time, and under very peculiar circum- 
stances, it may not be sinful, and cannot consistently with the 
greatest good be abandoned, without some previous means of 
preparation. 



ESSAY. 131 

if in any sense you hold slaves, then the least we 
could ask of you would be, that with contrition of 
heart you should instantaneously cease to indulge 
in this sin, for all sin should be immediately 
abandoned. As it is, we only ask, that, just as 
fast as your slaves can be prepared for freedom, 
and as the providence of God may put it in your 
power to liberate them, you will do so. We are 
not so unwise as to expect that the work of ex- 
tinction can be accomplished in a day. We 
know, too, that you are not, in your church capac- 
ity, the constituted arbiters of the question as a 
question of State policy. And, so long as your 
legislatures and their constituencies are resolved 
on maintaining the system, perhaps you will be 
unable to effect as much as you desire in the way 
of promoting its overthrow. And yet, brethren, 
there is a way in which we think you can, with 
entire safety and manifest propriety, contribute 
largely and directly to the extinction of American 
slavery. Would the entire Southern church cease 
all personal participation in slavery, and throw 
her whole weight and influence into the scale of 
slavery's complete subversion, that " consumma- 
tion devoutly to be wished " would soon ensue. 
Slave-holding, no longer practised or justified by 
the church, but discountenanced, could not long 
retain its foothold in the State. Now if this be 



132 ESSAY. 

so, our slaveholding brethren will confess that 
they are imperiously bound, by motives of Chris- 
tian duty, to liberate their bondmen with all con- 
sistent speed. Meantime, and as one important 
means of qualifying them for freedom, you 
ought, 

2. To see to it that not only your own, but 
all the bondmen among you, — your entire 
slave population, — are furnished with the Bible, 
and qualified to read and comprehend it; and 
also with stated preaching. They need a 
written and preached gospel, were it only to fit 
them to exchange, with advantage, a state of 
vassalage for the dignity of freemen; for all 
experience proves that the Bible and the pulpit 
are of all instruments the best to qualify men 
safely to exercise the right of self-government. 
But there is a servitude more dreadful by far 
than any domestic bondage that men have ever 
groaned under ; and your slaves need the Bible, 
and the Bible preached, to prove God's instru- 
ments of breaking the chains imposed by Satan, 
and making them Christ's freemen. Before 
God and in prospect of eternity, the distinctions 
between the master and his slave dwindle into 
insignificance. Having souls that are alike 
impure and alike precious, alike remembered 
by a dying Saviour and alike in need of the 



ESSAY. 133 

regenerating change, they stand alike in need 
of God's Word, written and preached, as the 
Spirit's instrument in renewing and sanctifying 
the soul. Hence the Bible and preaching are 
as much the rightful inheritance of the slave as 
of the master. We rejoice that these truths 
and the obligations resulting therefrom are, to 
some extent, recognized by southern Christians ; 
and that, in spite of certain adverse statutes, 
so much is being done there for the spiritual 
well-being of the slaves. Go on, brethren, in 
the good work of evangelizing your slave pop- 
ulation ; in teaching them the art of reading and 
the rudiments of knowledge; in putting the 
Bible into their hands, and affording them 
stated opportunities to read it, and to hear it 
expounded by you and by Christ's ministers. 
Go on, we say, till there be not one southern 
slave, who, in point of religious privileges, is not 
on a footing of equality with yourselves. Pros- 
ecuting this laudable work in the spirit of love, 
you will probably encounter no serious opposi- 
tion. The adverse but dead statutes referred to 
will not, we hope, be galvanized into life, in order 
to oppose you. 

It only remains that we name a few things, 
which we trust our Southern brethren will unite 
with us in saying that they should refrain from 



134 ESSAY. 

doing. (1.) You ought not to, and we trust 
you will not, betray impatience and irritation, 
whenever we of the North attempt to press the 
claims of the enslaved on your attention. Your 
doing this, — as you sometimes have, — seems 
to indicate, that, in your opinion, we Northern 
Christians have no responsibility in regard to 
slavery and its evils ; and that when we discuss 
this theme we make ourselves " busybodies in 
other men's matters." To the justness of this 
opinion we cannot subscribe. While we dis- 
claim all right or intention to break our compact 
with you as States, we feel that American 
slavery is a question of too great moment to 
ourselves and to unborn generations for us to 
have no concern with or responsibility for ; and 
as patriots, as philanthropists, as Christians, we 
are constrained to do all that we rightfully may 
for the downfall of this hoary system of wrong 
and woe. If any of you differ with us in opinion 
on this theme, we trust you will allow us to dis- 
cuss it to our heart's content ; and that you will 
listen to our reasonings with Christian meekness 
and candor. Not to do so will be construed as 
an evidence of intrinsic weakness in your cause. 
(2.) You will freely admit, we presume, that 
certain practices are authorized by your slave 
laws, in which you must not indulge even so 



ESSAY. 



135 



long as by any necessity you hold slaves. 
Your slave codes, for example, do not rec- 
ognize the sanctity of family ties and the do- 
mestic affections as existing among slaves ; but, 
as Christian masters, you must. You doubt- 
less believe, as do we, that the marriage relation, 
with all its rights and immunities, was as much 
designed for the negro as for the white man; 
that he, as truly as the other, is entitled to " cleave 
unto his wife," unexposed to the danger of 
man's putting asunder what God hath so closely 
joined, that "they are no more twain, but one 
flesh." You believe, too, that God united hus- 
band and wife thus indissolubly, not simply that 
they might be a help and solace to each other in 
the toilsome pilgrimage of life, but that the chil- 
dren with which God should bless them might 
grow up under their supervision, and by them be 
qualified for a career of usefulness and honor. 
Thus you believe, and believing thus, you will 
not, we trust, counteract God's benevolent de- 
signs, by countenancing, in your own practice, 
the separation of husbands and wives, or of 
parents and their offspring. We feel assured, 
that, whatever your laws may allow, or non-pro- 
fessing masters around you may do, you will 
never ignore the conjugal or parental rights of 
your servants, or indulge in any thing adapted to 



136 ESSAY. 

mar their domestic enjoyment. Were you to do 
so, we confess we could not extend to you " the 
right hand of fellowship " as brethren in Christ 
Were a church-member of ours to practise thus, 
we should regard him as amenable to discipline. 
We should also regard it as disciplinable for a 
master to overwork, or brutally chastise, or but 
half feed and clothe his servants; or to hold 
slaves for mere purposes of gain, or to traffic in 
them. None of these inhumanities could we 
reconcile with the obligations of a Christian 
profession ; and we confidently hope that in these 
views you will heartily concur, and that with 
them your practice will correspond. 

Christian brethren of the North and the South ! 
The question we have been considering is one of 
vast moment. Upon the right disposition of it 
are suspended, under God, interests of immeas- 
urable value, and which stretch far out into the 
unseen future of our country and the world. 
Coming ages and unborn generations are to be 
affected, favorably or otherwise, by the decision 
of this vexed question ; and, brethren, unless I 
misjudge, its right decision is, to a very great ex- 
tent, lodged in our hands. As decides the Amer- 
ican church, so, methinks, will decide the 
American people. And now, — may I confess 
it ? — I have dared to hope that the sentiments 



ESSAY. 137 

of this Essay are not only sound, but in unison 
with the views of the great mass of American 
Christians. Are we not agreed in this : that 
American slavery is a system of deep injustice 
and wrong, not sanctioned by the Word or the 
providence of God ; fraught with incalculable 
mischief to the interests of both masters, and 
slaves,- and to the social and religious well-being 
of our whole country ; a blot on the escutcheon 
both of the nation and of the church ; a weapon 
for scepticism to wield, and an obstacle to the 
introduction of millennial glory; and hence, a 
system which ought speedily to terminate, and 
which all good men should unitedly oppose and 
seek to subvert ? If we are thus agreed, let us 
join hands as well as hearts, and, swerving neither 
to the extreme of passive indifference on the one 
hand nor to that of erratic fanaticism on the 
other, in the majesty of principle let us move 
calmly onward, a phalanx of Christian philan- 
thropists, attempting naught but what they are 
assured God would have them attempt, and em- 
ploying only such means as are warranted by an 
enlightened conscience. Leaning prayerfully on 
Him who hears the sighing of the oppressed, let 
us push vigorously forward, and, though the year 
of jubilee has not yet fully come, be assured it 
will come, — that proud day, when not only 



138 ESSAY. 

" throughout all the land," but throughout the 
civilized world, liberty shall be proclaimed " unto 
all the inhabitants thereof." Hasten its advent, 
" O Thou that hearest prayer," and that " de- 
lightest in mercy ! " Amen and Amen. 






tOCSC 






mm?-?xmtoc < c <o^m 






i ct* 



c-<Sf L 









,-C.<^C\... ; x CC'CCC CCC 



cC J33K: 



^c#<«£ 






CX <ccccc cc 



cfc^CT c.OC 



C c-J. 

C. ... tC< 










^-' 


i^^w 


\ 


<£ 


tfe^Pf 




c^K^t^ 




c 








c 


c~< 3 <-"«sL" *z- mad 







M£ 



c£ '< '•' 



< cCCC^ 



'£ m£% 












» I 















LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



011899 4711 f 






^•^^^jS^fe-'^S^?^^^;.^ 













jr:^: 



